DEA: More than 30 Maricopa County deaths linked to cartel-made drugs

More than 30 fatalities in Maricopa County were caused by a deadly substance laced in fake prescription drugs that entered Arizona through Mexico, the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration said Tuesday.

The 32 confirmed overdose deaths in the county, recorded from May 2015 to February 2017, were reportedly from black-market pills laced with illegally made fentanyl, a powerful opioid said to be 100 times stronger than morphine.

Though pharmaceutical fentanyl is legal in the United States for treatment of cancer patients with severe chronic pain, illicitly manufactured versions of the synthetic opioid are often mixed with heroin or cocaine, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention stated.

The DEA Heroin Enforcement Action Team attributed the fatalities to counterfeit oxycodone pills laced with fentanyl that were manufactured and smuggled into the United States by Mexican drug-trafficking organizations.

"What we have is a rapidly expanding opioid-based drug addiction in the country, and we have Mexican drug cartels adjusting to push dangerous drugs on streets," said Doug Coleman, special agent in charge of the DEA in Arizona. "...They think they're taking oxy, but they're actually taking fentanyl, and it's lights out."

The Maricopa County Medical Examiner's Office discovered that in addition to fentanyl, nearly 75 percent of the overdoses contained dipyrone, a painkiller banned for use in the country since 1977.

RELATED: DEA to police: Fentanyl can kill you, too

The 32 people who died ranged in age from 16 to 64 years old, with an average age of 35. Nearly 75 percent of the deaths were men, and white addicts accounted for 50 percent of the deaths, the DEA reported. Eleven of the deaths were in Phoenix; seven occurred in Mesa; and the remaining 14 occurred in neighboring Valley cities. September and November 2016 totaled the largest number of deaths, with five fatalities each.

It remains unknown how many fentanyl-related deaths occurred throughout the state. More than 2,000 fentanyl-related overdoses were recorded nationally in 2015, according to multistate death reports cited by the DEA.

Coleman said the addiction typically begins when someone is prescribed a set amount of opioids by a doctor that is then abused, leading addicts to switch to street-level heroin.

"It affects all classes, all age groups," said Coleman. "...It affects everybody because it really starts with a pill that you get from a doctor so there's a perception that it's OK. ... People don't realize that the doctor is prescribing it for a specific purpose and a specific amount to treat a specific condition but it's just heroin in pill form."

Coleman said the DEA was aware of the pills entering through the Arizona-Mexico border but initially thought they were being transported elsewhere. Presently, thousands of drugs being sold for $15 to 20 per pill still remain on the streets in the Valley with no way for addicts to tell if it is a genuine oxycodone.

He said the cartels previously purchased fentanyl directly from China until this month when it was outlawed. Chemicals used to create the drug are still available for purchase through China, and Mexican cartels have taken it up themselves to manufacture fentanyl, Coleman said.

Coleman said the DEA would continue examining the spread of the drugs and work to identify and arrest the drug traffickers directly responsible for the overdose deaths.

"We're coming for all of you. It may take us a while to get there, but we're coming for everyone," he said.

The intentionally mislabeled drug takes much less to kill someone than oxycodone; it induces a lethargic state, slurred speech and can make users slip into a comatose state before they die, said Dr. Jeffrey Johnston, the chief Maricopa County medical examiner.

"In these types of deaths, what we typically see is that they are faster," Johnston said.

The number of deaths is likely to grow, too, because toxicology reports for subsequent deaths are still pending per the medical examiner's office, the DEA stated. Four related deaths were recorded in February.

"It's going to get worse before it gets better," Coleman said.