Fentanyl

Arizona and other southwestern states bordering Mexico have become a hot spot in the nation's fentanyl crisis. Fentanyl deaths tripled in Arizona alone from 2015 through 2017.

U.S. officials announced their biggest fentanyl bust ever last month — nearly 254 pounds seized from a truckload of cucumbers, enough to potentially kill millions. Valued at $3.5 million

With plenty of pills and powder sold locally out of the arriving fentanyl shipments that are also distributed around the U.S., the drug that has surpassed heroin for overdose deaths has touched all Arizona demographic groups.

Popping the pills at parties "is a lot more widespread than we know," said Yavapai County Sheriff's Lt. Nate Auvenshine. "There's less stigma to taking a pill than putting a needle in your arm, but one of these pills can have enough fentanyl for three people."

https://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/fentanyl-deaths-mexican-oxy-pills-hit-arizona-hard-n971536