Americans Crossing The Border Are Causing A Spike In Fentanyl Overdoses In Mexico
Hundreds of Americans are now traveling to Mexico to get high on fentanyl, causing a notable spike in the use of the opioid in Mexico.
TIJUANA, México.—Fentanyl is not sold, consumed or made in Mexico, according to what Mexican president Andrés Manuel López Obrador recently said. But addicts in the streets of Tijuana, especially the ‘gringos’, might have a different opinion.
“Everything here has fentanyl. Every single drug, and it is way more cheap than in the U.S.,” said Lily, a 37-year-old woman from Washington state who has been living in the streets of Tijuana for the past six years.
Hundreds of Americans are now traveling to Mexico to get high on fentanyl, causing a notable spike in the use of the opioid in Mexico.
All that Lily wanted was freedom. Before traveling to San Diego and then crossing the border over to Tijuana, Lily was living with her parents in Washington state. But she needed more freedom.
“I felt like I was trapped. I couldn’t party, I couldn’t go crazy or anything. I always ended up in jail,” Lily said. “So I traveled to San Diego, I heard they had good party and cheap heroine and pills. And it was ok.”
But San Diego was not enough. Drugs in Tijuana were not really cheaper than in San Diego, but here, she could party for days and sleep in the streets.
“No one bothered me here. So I could use meth as I wanted and just live here. I liked that. But then fentanyl got to the city…that’s when everything got fucked,” she said.
As Lily recalls how things were before the pandemic four years ago, she starts crying. She started off with meth, she says. “But I needed to sleep…so I started with fentanyl.”
“I just wanted to be free, you know.”
But Lily’s freedom is having a deadly effect on the local addicts.