DEA says it's seized 4 million deadly doses of fentanyl in Michigan, Ohio

Between May and September of this year, the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration seized enough fentanyl in Michigan and Ohio to kill 4 million people, Orville Green, special agent in charge of the DEA's Detroit Field Division said Wednesday.

"For us the most urgent drug threat to our communities is fentanyl and that is the message the DEA wants to get out there," Green said.

The breakdown goes like this:

In Michigan, the DEA seized 2,586 pills, representing 1,137 deadly doses of fentanyl.

In Ohio, it seized enough 87,000 pills and 65 kg of fentanyl powder or enough to kill 4,700,022 people.

Fentanyl routinely travels between Michigan and Ohio along the I-75 corridor. It's likely that fentanyl seized was heading to or coming from Michigan, the DEA said. The ultra-deadly synthetic opioid is mixed with heroin and pressed into counterfeit pills that resemble Percocet or oxycodone or Xanax. It is also pressed into rainbow fentanyl, colorful pills that look like candy, which the DEA says represents a deliberate attempt to get young people hooked on the drug. The DEA has found rainbow fentanyl in Michigan and Ohio, Green said.

The DEA highlighted the seizures as part of its One Pill Can Kill campaign to raise awareness about the danger of buying pills without a prescription. Black market pills are especially popular on social media, specifically Snapchat, Green said. Buyers and sellers use emojis to identify pills. Forty percent of the pills sold by dealers contain fentanyl, Green said

More:How these emojis are used to buy and sell drugs

More:DEA warns of rainbow fentanyl powder, pills

More:Counterfeit pills flooding drug market

In 2020, three young people ― two brothers ages 20 and 18 and a female friend, 17 ― died of fentanyl overdoses after ingesting pills they believed to be Percocet. The man who provided the pills,now 22, is currently serving eight to 15 for involuntary manslaughter in connection with those deaths.

A record-breaking 107,000 people in the U.S., including 3,040 in Michigan, died of drug overdoses last year and the majority of those deaths were caused by fentanyl. The synthetic opioid is up to 50 times more powerful than heroin and up to 100 times more powerful than morphine.

According to the DEA, 2 milligrams of fentanyl ― enough to fit on the tip of a pencil ― is enough to be lethal.

"What we would like is for parents, for families to have conversations about the dangers of fentanyl, about the dangers of fake pills," said Green. "If you weren't prescribed a pill you should not take it because it's absolutely dangerous."