As unregulated abortion pills flood into the United States from rogue websites or by other methods, a U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) public safety alert is warning the American public that, “of the fentanyl-laced fake prescription pills analyzed in 2022, six out of ten now contain a potentially lethal dose of fentanyl.”
As a result, the DEA warned the American public to “Never take a pill that wasn’t prescribed directly to you. Never take a pill from a friend. Never take a pill bought on social media.”
“The only safe medications are ones prescribed by a trusted medical professional and dispensed by a licensed pharmacist,” the DEA claimed.
DEA on fentanyl: One Pill Can Kill
The DEA does not regulate the abortion pill mifepristone or its companion drug misoprostol, used in the two-drug abortion pill regimen. It also does not regulate the unapproved one-drug misoprostol regimen. Yet, these abortion-inducing drugs are becoming easier to obtain outside the protections of a legal prescription.
And while the DEA warning focused specifically on drugs like OxyContin®, Percocet®, and Xanax®, the alert raises the question: why has law enforcement seemed uninterested in focusing on the highly unregulated dispensing of the abortion pill or recent news that abortion pills are being illegally trafficked from Mexico into the U.S.?
According to DEA Administrator Anne Milgram, the fentanyl-laced fake prescription pills “are being mass-produced by the Sinaloa Cartel and the Jalisco Cartel in Mexico,” Milgram claimed. “Fentanyl remains the deadliest drug threat facing this country. It is a highly addictive synthetic opioid that is 50 times more potent than heroin and 100 times more potent than morphine. Just two milligrams of fentanyl, the small amount that fits on the tip of a pencil, is considered a potentially deadly dose,” DEA’s alert stated.
Just last month, Live Action News detailed disturbing news that multiple groups were illegally trafficking in abortion drugs. These included Las Libres, located in Mexico, which is behind efforts to smuggle abortion drugs into the United States. “The medications are arriving in a thousand ways, in creative ways, into the hands of women,” Verónica Cruz Sánchez, founder of Las Libres, told CNN.
According to the same CNN article, “three Mexican women quietly crossed into the country at different points along the border, dozens of abortion-inducing pills hidden in their belongings. The medication, an FDA-approved two-drug combination, had traveled across the interior of Mexico in the previous days, handled by an underground network of some 30 organizations in the country.”
“The scope is staggering,” tweeted Caroline Kitchener of the Washington Post. “A covert, cross-border network of abortion activists is funneling thousands of abortion pills into the United States. I interviewed 16 people and visited 4 U.S. cities + Mexico to try to wrap my arms around this operation.”
Kitchener added in the Twitter thread,”The pipeline typically begins in Mexico, where activist suppliers secure pills for free or a few dollars. Hundreds of U.S.-based volunteers – who have been joining this movement in droves since Roe fell – then receive the pills through the U.S. mail. 2/”.
“Just one of several Mexico-based suppliers at the center of the operation says it’s on track to facilitate 20,000 abortions in the U.S. this year. That amounts to ~20% of all legal abortions that took place in 2019 in the 13 states where abortion is now almost entirely banned. 3/,” she tweeted, adding, “Many of the pills arrive in old medicine bottles, unmarked and unsealed, to avoid detection. Abortion rights groups voiced concern that – as networks expand to include less credible suppliers – women could start to receive fake pills that are ineffective or even dangerous. 6/”.
NEW: A covert, cross-border network of abortion activists is funneling thousands of abortion pills into the United States. I interviewed 16 people and visited 4 U.S. cities + Mexico to try to wrap my arms around this operation. The scope is staggering.🧵https://t.co/6IXVFUeiZs
— Caroline Kitchener (@CAKitchener) October 18, 2022
Red Necesito Abortar is another Mexico-based abortion pill syndicate, according to the Washington Post. Others, referred to as “Old Hippies,” are asked to raise funds and buy pills in Mexico that would then be distributed in Texas and other states. They will attempt to purchase as many abortion-inducing drugs as possible at “pharmacies gravitated to younger female clerks,” according to the NewYorker.
One group known as “Pills on Wheels” carried abortion drugs across the Mexico border into the U.S. where she discovered that though “Border Patrol agents had sometimes searched her luggage and X-rayed her car, they had never opened her toiletry kit. It was there that she tucked two plastic bottles containing three hundred and thirty-six [336] pills of misoprostol,” the NewYorker reported.
A New York Times report highlighted another abortion pill activist, Crystal P. Lira, who allegedly told them she previously brought pills from Tijuana to California and then shipped them to Georgia, Indiana, Massachusetts, and Texas.
Despite the open way these syndicates operate, law enforcement seems to be either willfully unconcerned or intentionally turning a blind eye to illegal abortion pill traffickers. And while at least for now, the incidence of fentanyl-laced abortion pills may appear low or nonexistent, the DEA’s alert — which warned that “Just one pill is dangerous and one pill can kill” — makes some wonder what it will take to get law enforcement to focus on the growing illegal abortion pill trade.
