Suella Braverman: 'Inevitable' that fentanyl will flood UK drug market

Suella Braverman admits it’s ‘inevitable’ that fentanyl will soon flood Britain’s drugs market as Home Secretary uses US trip to see first-hand evidence of the country’s opioid crisis

Suella Braverman today admitted it was ‘inevitable’ that fentanyl would replace heroin among drug users in Britain.

The Home Secretary, who is on a trip to the US, saw first-hand evidence of how America is trying to combat its opioid crisis.

Fentanyl, which is up to 50 times stronger than heroin, is a powerful synthetic opioid that has played a large part in the overdose epidemic in the US.

Mrs Braverman visited the Drugs Enforcement Administration (DEA) headquarters in Baltimore, Maryland, to talk to agents about the fentanyl crisis across America.

She voiced fears the drug could soon be more prevalent on the UK’s drugs market.

Suella Braverman visited the Drugs Enforcement Administration (DEA) headquarters in Baltimore, Maryland , to talk to agents about the fentanyl crisis across America.

Fentanyl, which is up to 50 times stronger than heroin, is a powerful synthetic opioid that has played a large part in the overdose epidemic in the US

‘In the UK it’s mainly heroin, and we’re seeing emerging signs of fentanyl coming into the drug-supply market, but it’s not at the scale,’ she told one of the agents.

‘I think it’s inevitable, personally, as the price of heroin will go up and supply goes down.’

The number of people who died from a druge overdose in 2021 in the US was more than six times the number in 1999.

Between those years, nearly 645,000 people died from an overdose involving any opioid – including prescription or illegally-made fentanyl.

Just two milligrams of fentanyl can be lethal.

During a discussion with Jarod Forget, the special agent in charge of the DEA Washington division, Mrs Braverman added: ‘It’s a crisis isn’t it really, for Western countries?’

Mr Forget said the drug was sold online and there had been occasions when young people had died after buying pills they did not realise had fentanyl in.

He said: ‘They don’t know that they’re getting a fake xanax that is in fact a fentanyl pill and it has over two milligrams of fentanyl.

‘I’ve met a lot of parents in this area that have woken up the next day to find their son or daughter deceased because they bought a pill online, thinking it was a xanax or oxycodone when in fact it was a fake.’

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