
How Fentanyl Ingredients From China End Up in the U.S. - Thorondor
https://www.theatlantic.com/health/archive/2019/08/chinese-company-helping-fuel-opioid-epidemic/596254/
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refurb
I used to work in chemistry a while back and the trend at the time was
outsourcing chemical precursors from China. In the late 1990’s it was rare to
buy from them, but by mid-2000’s most of our chemicals came from China. They
literally sprouted a whole chemical industry pretty quickly.

Send drug precursors just came along with that capability. Want to order a
starting material for Lipitor? Sure! What about fentanyl itself? Sure! Just
another chemical.

~~~
Scoundreller
The unusual thing is that it used to be India that was the source for generic
drug company's APIs, with the basic bulk materials coming from China.

Either China ramped up its domestic game and/or India itself outsourced to
China.

~~~
refurb
My impression (limited it might be) is that a lot of drug companies went to
India to manufacture their own drugs. As you mention, India already had some
experience through their domestic generic drug industry.

China built out their own outsourcing outfits somewhat on their own and then
US manufacturing shifted to them after.

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rogerkirkness
I feel like the whole "disrupter selling the imcumbent's people opiates" [1]
is a recursive theme in statecraft.

[1]:
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_opium_in_China](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_opium_in_China)

~~~
roboys
Except China isn't forcing us to buy opium at gun point.

Couple things that would be interesting to find out..

1\. What percentage of the company's total fentanyl pre-cursor sales are for
legitimate medical purposes?

2\. What percentage of total orders are fentanyl pre-cursor orders?

Hard to assess scale without this information.

*The people downvoting don't realize there are legitimate uses for fentanyl or what? It's a prescribed painkiller (fyi).

~~~
ngold
England didn't force Chinese citizens to become drug addicts. That came from
mass poverty. And the English were happy to get all that silver back for all
the tea they had been buying.

As for the miserable poverty England had, they were happy to have their own
citizens drink themselves to death.

And when the emperor said enough is enough, the british took a page out of
Americas playboy with dealing with japan and trade. But went step further.

And now we have the second largest economy pulling out victimhood, and
Americas grand old party is using the same playbook.

Get in power, play a victim, and crush hard working people under your heel.

~~~
billyhoffman
I think you have your dates wrong.

The Chinese, after repeated requests through diplomatic means and appealing
directly to Queen Victoria, seized all the opium the foreign merchants were
bringing into Canton, destroyed it, and then refused to compensate them. This
lead to the British Navy interceding. This happened in 1839, 13 years before
US Admiral Perry opened Japan with gunship diplomacy.

Don’t get me wrong, both of these actions are abhorrent. But mid 19th century
Britain needed no guidebook on how to impose its will

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xkcd-sucks
If you go down the chain far enough, almost anything is a "drug precursor" \--
This is why a skinny trashy white person in possession of acetone and iodine
can be charged with manufacturing methamphetamine.

Fentanyls are pretty simple molecules to make, and banning the "precursors"
mentioned here basically means one needs to choose a slightly different
synthetic route, or make a slightly different drug.

As for the Chinese company profiled in the article, it is literally the same
as any other successful Chinese company in every aspect -- Except for the part
where they explicitly discussed Fentanyl and demonstrated that they knew it
was a common drug of abuse. But, without personal first hand exposure, they
might well consider fentanyl to be the same as cannabis or ketamine, also
widely reviled "drugs of abuse" in China.

So, a charitable reading of this article just comes off as uncritical
fearmongering. A cynical reading frames it as a "war on drugs" / "war on
China" piece.

~~~
cr0sh
> This is why a skinny trashy white person in possession of acetone and iodine
> can be charged with manufacturing methamphetamine.

Has this actually happened? You need a few more ingredients in the chain
before you get meth out the other end...I would hope a jury would know this.

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neilv
If this is indeed a major source for ingredients for illegal fentanyl reaching
the US, why hasn't it been cut off at that point, through diplomatic channels
between the US and China?

Edit: This is an entirely sincere question, and seems an obviously relevant
followup to the article, and important to US society plagued by opiate abuse.
I realize, after downvoting, that my question could be read multiple ways, but
I'll leave it as I initially asked it.

~~~
Scoundreller
It may not matter at this point.

It's so cheap and scalable to produce and so potent, I figure importers "Got
while the gettin was good" and already moved containers of precursors or
active ingredients state-side.

It could take decades to wash out.

Meanwhile the focus seems to be on ultra-small scale importers bringing in a
few grams through the mail.

The kingpins love this distraction, because it just cuts out their competition
by removing consumers' direct access to manufacturers.

~~~
spaceflunky
Excellent point. I would bet anything that the chinese government gave their
oligarchs ample amount of time to move a large buffer of inventory before the
ban went into effect.

