WUSF | By Cathy Carter
PublishedJune 3, 2024 at 8:38 AM EDT
America's fentanyl crisisisn't letting up as drug cartels continue to flood communities with the deadly opioid.
A new documentary, "The Fentanyl Project," reveals the impact the synthetic drug has had in Sarasota County.
The film, which premiered at the Sarasota Film Festival, focuses on two local families dealing with the unexpected loss of a child and sibling after taking pills they did not know were laced with fentanyl.
KT Curran, the film's director, recently spoke with WUSF's Cathy Carter.
KT, your film tells the story of the fentanyl crisis through the lens of law enforcement and medical professionals but most powerfully by the families who have lost loved ones to fentanyl, including a 24-year-old named Nicolette Arecco.
Yes, that's right. She had recently lost her grandmother the week before and she was very close to her. So, when her grandmother passed, she was under a lot of anxiety, grief and stress, and a friend offered to give her a Xanax. She was at home; the Xanax was delivered. She took this pill, and within minutes, she was dead.
The issue of fake pills is one of the important things you talk about in this film. Pills that are designed to look like something else but actually contain fentanyl.
Yes, illegal drug dealers are getting fentanyl and pressing it into fake pills that look like legitimate pills people take for a variety of reasons. Xanax. Adderall, Percocet, OxyContin, then they label them to look like the real thing. So, we're seeing thousands of people overdosing. Over 100,000 in America last year.
Courtesy of Wingspan Productions
And the reason they produce these fake pills is because they are easier to transport. Yes?
Yes, it's cheap and easy to transport. And it only takes a few granules to kill someone. And especially in the case of young people, who are not hard-core opioid users, a tiny little bit of fentanyl can kill them. Their systems are not adapted to opioid use.
These stories are heartbreaking. And one of the more powerful scenes in your film is when Nicolette’s brother, Matthew, had to tell his mom that she died.
As I was filming that scene, I was so devastated. We were all in tears. I forgot the camera was rolling. I couldn't break away to even check my camera focus. And I kept stopping and saying, are you all right? Are you sure you want to share this with people on film? They all felt strongly that if only one person could hear their story, their life could be saved. They are doing such a powerful force for good in our community, and now across the country as the film spreads.
And you also spoke with professionals on the ground dealing with the fentanyl crisis. Sarasota Sheriff Kurt Hoffman says he's never seen anything like this in all his years in law enforcement.
Yes, when I spoke with the sheriff, he had just returned from a national meeting of all the sheriffs in America and every single sheriff said the No. 1 problem they're facing is fentanyl. We're seeing overdoses in Sarasota County every week from fentanyl. The sheriff's department was the first department I believe in the state of Florida to carry Narcan on all their officers so they can immediately administer Narcan, which can reverse an opioid overdose.
Courtesy of Wingspan Productions.
You also spoke with doctors from Sarasota Memorial Hospital to see how it's impacting the medical community, and one of the doctors said, "we are all just 1 or 2 degrees of separation from someone who has experienced this drug in some way."
I mean, just for me traveling through Florida with the film, every day someone in a restaurant, in a store, at a screening of the film has told me they know of someone who has lost a loved one to fentanyl poisoning.
So, after a month of researching and filming, getting to know the families, editing, what is your big takeaway from your movie?
I feel like the problem with fentanyl is so complex. You could look at the problem of the border, or you can look at how fentanyl is getting into America. You could look at why we're taking fentanyl. With my documentary, I wanted to focus on fake pills and how families can understand that fake pills are out there and that they cannot trust their eyes just by looking at a pill. It must come from a licensed medical provider or from a pharmacist. And I think as parents, or people who love young adults in our lives, we want children to know this information. This is not the drug of 10, 20 years ago. This is a drug with the power to kill with just a few granules.
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