Mar 4, 2017 3 min read

Last April 21, the news broke about lunchtime. And it was a jaw-dropper.

Prince was dead.

The groundbreaking rock singer and guitarist was found unresponsive in an elevator at the combination home and studio he presided over outside his native Minneapolis. Though he had previously been known for his clean-living ways and, at 58, was decades removed from the live-fast-and-die-young rock cohort of Jimi Hendrix, Janis Joplin and Jim Morrison, Prince ended up dying the same way they did – of a drug overdose.

An autopsy found Prince was claimed by an overdose of fentanyl, yet another opioid that is killing thousands of Americans in an ongoing, agonizing epidemic.

In 2015, the last year for which figures were available, 50,000 Americans died from drug overdoses. That’s enough to fill Yankee Stadium.

And fentanyl, which is reportedly 40 times more deadly than heroin, has been implicated in more and more overdose deaths.

A report released in February by Washington County Coroner Tim Warco outlined the toll opioids have taken in this area. In 2016, there was a spike of roughly 30 percent in the number of overdose deaths in the county compared to the year before.

Last year, there were 109 overdose deaths, compared to 73 in 2015. The youngest victim was 14, while the oldest was 83. Twenty of the overdose victims – close to one-fifth – had just fentanyl in their systems, while more had a combination of heroin and fentanyl, and some had those two drugs along with others, such as alcohol and cocaine.

Warco painted a picture of addicts who are desperate, heedless, or probably a bit of both.

“Some of the people using drugs have no idea what they are buying,” he said. “They go from prescription medications that are made in a controlled environment of a pharmaceutical company to street drugs on the black market where there is no quality control.”

Law enforcement officials have said fentanyl, which is available in spray or patch forms, is likely being manufactured in China or Mexico and being smuggled into the United States. The euphoric high fentanyl offers is potent and deadly. Just a small amount can kill. Some observers fear that it could be as lethal to individuals and communities as crack was in the 1980s.

Officials on the federal, state and local levels have been marshaling their forces to fight the opioid epidemic, and there is something of a consensus that the best way to confront it is through treatment and education, not stuffing our jails with addicted inmates.

But there is also a corresponding determination to prosecute dealers, who are spreading this poison on our streets and into our homes.

If we have learned anything in the years that opioids have been laying waste to lives and potential, it’s that this problem defies easy, pat solutions. Resources have to be earmarked for treatment.

Addicts deserve our compassion, as do the friends and families of those who have lost loved ones. Narcan, which can reverse overdoses, needs to be provided to first responders. And dealers need to be put away.

It will be a long, painful slog. But it’s the only path that’s available.