The Right Is Lying About Fentanyl and Pain Management!
Addressing some of the myths surrounding fentanyl and chronic pain.
NOTE: I originally posted this article on my Facebook page December 19, 2025. I’m reposting it here in its entirely with a new title, a few typos edited, and a few minor formatting changes. Unfortunately, I was right about Trump using fentanyl as an excuse to invade Venezuela.
Since it’s likely to be used as an excuse to invade Venezuela, I want to talk about fentanyl. Specifically, some of the myths surrounding it. This is going to be longer than most of my other posts.
Up front, I want to say I’m not an expert on drugs or addiction. I can only share what I’ve learned and researched. If you’re struggling with addiction, please get help from a licensed professional.
Additionally, fentanyl is a dangerous drug and what I’m about to say is not intended to dispute, downplay, or dismiss this. In my opinion, it’s important to dispel myths about a potentially deadly drug because they cloud the discussion and cause people with good intentions to pursue methods of dealing with the problem that are at best unproductive and at worst counterproductive.
Finally, addiction is a disease not a moral failing [1]. Here in the US we tend to treat addiction as criminal behavior vs a medical problem and this prevents people from seeking the help they need. This is one of the reasons I push for the legalization/decriminalization of all drugs and a complete overhaul of how we treat drug addiction.
With all that said, let’s talk about the myths!
MYTH #1: No one needs opioids
I would be remiss I didn’t address this myth first. Chronic pain is real and, in some cases, the best way to treat it is with opioids. There are multiple different types of pain medications (e.g. NSAIDs) and all of them work differently. Opioids work by blocking the chemical reactions that cause pain in the body [2]. For some people, this is what they need to manage their pain. The Opioid Epidemic wasn’t necessarily caused by prescribing opioids, it was caused by over-prescribing them. One of the issues with the handling of the Opioid Epidemic, especially during Trump’s first term, was the overcorrection of this problem. This made opioids harder to get for people who needed them [3][4]. This brings me to the next myth...
MYTH #2: Pain can’t kill you
Pain doesn’t just hurt, it can do both physical and psychological damage to a person. People suffering from chronic pain have a higher chance of suffering from heart attacks due to the increased stress the pain places on the body [5]. They also have a higher chance of ending their lives [4][6]. As stated above, the overcorrections in response to the opioid epidemic have made it harder for people who need opioids to get them. This is why it’s important to dispel the myths associated with fentanyl.
MYTH #3: Fentanyl can be absorbed through the skin
I first learned about fentanyl many years ago from all the stories about cops losing consciousness or dying because they brushed fentanyl off their uniforms or otherwise touched it. It turns out either those accounts were leaving out important details or they simply weren’t true. Fentanyl can’t be absorbed through the skin from casual contact with the drug [7]. When you see videos of cops passing out because of “contact with fentanyl,” what they’re actually passing out from is fear or anxiety [8].
MYTH #4: Undocumented immigrants are the ones bringing fentanyl in the country
Around 90% of the fentanyl smuggled into the US is done by US CITIZENS through AUTHORIZED ENTRY POINTS [9]. And those who weren’t US citizens were mostly people given permission to cross the border, which is why they were passing through authorized ports of entry [10]. To take it a step further, only 0.009% of immigrants arrested by Custom and Border Patrol (CBP) for crossing illegally were found to have fentanyl [11].
MYTH #5: Fentanyl is an illegal drug
Fentanyl is a legal in the US. It is a Schedule II drug (like most other opioids) often administered in hospitals for pain relief. It’s cheaper to produce than heroin and morphine due to it being fully synthetic. What makes it dangerous and addictive is its potency. Fentanyl is much more powerful than heroin [12]. Its potency is one of the reasons so many people overdose on it. A heroin addict will inject the same quantity of fentanyl that they would heroin and will overdose as a result. The other reason people overdose is they don’t know they’re taking fentanyl. Because it’s so cheap, fentanyl is often mixed with other drugs (e.g. cocaine) to trick people into paying more for less. A person will snort the mixture not knowing they’re also inhaling fentanyl.
MYTH #6: The Opioid Epidemic started with fentanyl
Purdue Pharma started the opioid epidemic with their drug Oxycontin in the 1990s. There are multiple books, newspapers articles, and the legal documents from the lawsuit against Purdue Pharma that provide the full details of the epidemic so I will only provide a summary here.
Oxycontin was an opioid created for relief from severe pain associated with injuries, surgery, and some forms of chronic pain. Purdue bribed multiple hospitals and doctors who specialized in pain management to promote the drug as a source of pain relief. This caused other doctors to also prescribe it to their patients. What Purdue Pharma kept hidden was OxyContin was very addictive.
Listening to the medical authorities Purdue bribed, well-meaning doctors would prescribe OxyContin for pain relief. Patients would get addicted to it. Doctors would, especially as its dangers became more well-known, stop prescribing the drug to their patients. This would force many patients to seek pain relief through other means. Either this meant buying OxyContin off the street or using other opioids that were more addictive and more dangerous, such as heroin and fentanyl. Fentanyl caused most of the deaths associated with the Opioid Epidemic [13].
The lawsuit against Sackler Family, who oversaw Purdue at the time, requires them to pay $7 billion over 15 years, but that is a fraction of what they made off the drug that started the epidemic [14].
This is not intended to be a comprehensive list of myths about fentanyl. I just wanted to tackle the ones politicians have been spreading to get elected and/or justify their reactionary political agendas. I especially wanted to post something after Trump classified fentanyl as a WMD [15]. As someone who was alive during Bush II, I know how many atrocities were justified under the guise of “eliminating WMDs.”
Sources:
[1] https://iuhealth.org/thrive/is-addiction-really-a-disease
[2] https://www.mayoclinic.org/diseases-conditions/back-pain/in-depth/chronic-pain-medication-decisions/art-20360371
[3] https://news.wttw.com/2018/05/11/opioid-epidemic-leaving-chronic-pain-patients-out-cold
[4] https://www.politico.com/story/2018/08/28/how-the-opioid-crackdown-is-backfiring-752183
[5] https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/19726210/
[6] https://www.jpain.org/article/S1526-5900(23)00452-2/fulltext
[7] https://health.ucdavis.edu/news/headlines/can-fentanyl-be-absorbed-through-your-skin/2022/10
[8] https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC8810663/
[9] https://www.cbp.gov/border-security/frontline-against-fentanyl
[10] https://www.americanimmigrationcouncil.org/fact-sheet/fentanyl-smuggling/
[11] https://www.cato.org/blog/us-citizens-were-89-convicted-fentanyl-traffickers-2022
[12] https://www.yalemedicine.org/news/fentanyl-driving-overdoses
[13] https://www.cdc.gov/overdose-prevention/about/understanding-the-opioid-overdose-epidemic.html
[14] https://www.pbs.org/newshour/nation/judge-formally-approves-opioid-settlement-for-purdue-pharma-and-sackler-family-members-who-own-the-company
[15] https://www.npr.org/2025/12/15/nx-s1-5645149/wmd-fentanyl-trump-cartels
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