By Bernardo Moreno
The United States is going through one of the worst public health crises in its history. Fentanyl has displaced other substances on the black market and has become very attractive to drug traffickers in Mexico and the United States. The issue does not escape political implications, and there is a story to unravel. In this interview, Dr. Domingo Schievenini, historian from UNAM and member of the National System of Researchers (SNI), will explain it to us.
BM: When did opioid trafficking between Mexico and the U.S. begin?
DS: We could go back to the production of heroin in Mexican laboratories in the 1950s. Due to its lower price and greater potency, Mexican production displaced French and Chinese heroin, whose main destination was to satisfy U.S. demand. In addition, a network of micro-trafficking, “ant trafficking,” was opened on the border, which has not stopped since then. It is easier and more profitable —and much less risky— to cross a kilogram of heroin (or today a kilo of fentanyl) than to cross a ton of cannabis or opium, as international drug trafficking networks used to do.
BM: And then came the boom in legal opioid prescriptions?
DS: Yes, in the 1990s, with a wave of drugs (the so-called prescription painkillers) that accustomed a large sector of the U.S. population to their use, in this case opioids of pharmaceutical origin. Within the framework of this irresponsible wave of prescriptions, many people obtained the substances on the illegal market, and many others became addicted. It was then that the networks linked to the criminal economies saw an opportunity in Mexico and reactivated the production of heroin that emerged in the 1950s. But the production of this heroin —known as black tar— required hundreds of hectares of fields to plant poppies, especially in states like Guerrero, Durango, Sinaloa, and Nayarit. And this drew too much attention from the authorities. Then, the same criminal networks realized how it would be more profitable to satisfy the American demand with fentanyl (which has existed as a controlled drug since the 1960s) rather than with heroin.
BM: Is that fentanyl also produced in Mexico?
DS: Fentanyl is not a natural derivative of opium, and therefore no poppy fields are needed for its production. Rather, it requires chemical precursors that come from Asia and are mixed in simple laboratories, which can even be assembled in a kitchen. Those laboratories are the ones in Mexico.
BM: Parallel to its pharmaceutical manufacture and the clinical use that fentanyl has had for more than half a century, have its chemical precursors only been illegally trafficked from Mexico?
DS: No, also through Canada. I remember the last time I was in Vancouver, while we happened to be looking at a ship sailing on the horizon, an academic colleague asked me why in the history of drugs does nobody talk about Canada? And specifically, why is nobody talking about the “Vancouver connection”?
BM: Why not? Perhaps because it is more profitable to attack the Mexican cartels?
DS: Yes, it is more profitable in the media, politically, and electorally to blame the so-called Mexican “cartels” and more so now, when such complex federal (and state) elections are approaching in the U.S. and also in Mexico. However, if the trafficking networks were wiped out and disappeared in Mexico, they would migrate to the Caribbean or Central America or to Canada (where they have previously existed). In the end, the supply will exist as long as there is a demand.
BM: When did it start to be profitable to attack the Mexican cartels through the media?
DS: I remember that Hillary Clinton, in the run-up to the 2012 elections (which would represent Obama’s re-election), was already talking about the cartels in Mexico being considered a growing threat. During his tenure, Obama kept his distance from the issue. Then Trump, although he accused Mexico on several occasions, did not go overboard. Rather he turned the spotlight on China to hold them responsible for the opioid overdose crisis. The media turning point occurred when at the end of last year, the governor of Texas, Greg Abbott, presented an executive order accusing the Mexican cartels of terrorism, which was applauded and seconded by a sector of the political class and some media. But beyond the bickering, there is a discursive strategy in the bilateral relationship, which will remain as an element of pressure in the coming years.
BM: But is it a problem that really concerns the Mexican government?
DS: Yes, the problem of organized crime in Mexico has undoubtedly been the responsibility of municipal, state, and federal authorities for more than a century. However, in the specific case of fentanyl, it would also be necessary to analyze those who cannot stop demand and control their consumption.
BM: And who is responsible for this crisis?
DS: Before pointing out those responsible, I wonder: What drives millions of people to consume fentanyl? What kind of mental health and social crisis does an overdose epidemic like the one in the U.S. cause? On the other hand, and of the utmost importance, what do we know about distribution networks within the U.S.? Are these internal marketing networks perhaps the main beneficiaries of international traffic dynamics? How has a perfectly integrated criminal economy developed? Why are these internal networks not a national threat? Before looking for guilty parties and creating media enemies, it seems to me that these questions should be considered.
To be continued.
