Greetings -

Last May, Dr. Ruth Potee, the Opioid Task Force's Medical Director, in concert with Mark Klee, PharmD, with Baystate Health, sounded the alarm about the deadly presence of counterfeit pressed pills showing up in the drug supply and the danger it presents to our rural community, especially for our youth and young adults. They co-authored a letter, which you can find here, which was emailed to every school administrator in Franklin and Hampshire Counties with a list of every Western Massachusetts Prevention Coalition.

We wish we could say that conditions have improved in the past year. They have not. Laboratory testing conducted by the DEA in 2022 reveals that now six out of ten pills "were found to contain a lethal dose" of fentanyl, compared to four out of ten pills tested in 2021.

As fathers and elected officials, this is of grave concern as federal data reveal, per the New York Times, that "rates of illicit prescription pill use are now highest among people ages 18 to 25" years old in the nation.

We are also hearing and seeing reports of fentanyl being cut with other drugs such as xylazine or a range of other stimulants, such as cocaine, which are driving up increased fatal and non-fatal overdoses across the country.

As the opioid epidemic refuses to loosen its steely grip on our communities, we have to reimagine how we are communicating with our families, neighbors, friends, and colleagues about the ever-present dangers of contaminants in the drug supply. We plan to charge our Education and Prevention Committee, working in concert with our Healthcare Solutions Committee, to develop a concrete work plan that will outline a set of actions we can implement to continue to save lives in our rural region.

We hope you will consider supporting this effort.

Sincerely,