Tennessee sheriff warns locals not to pick up folded dollar bills because they could contain FENTANYL or meth amid fears children could find them on floor
- The Perry County Sherriff’s Office raised concerns to its locals on social media
- The substance was sent to a laboratory for tests, which came positive, after two reported incidents
- Traces of methamphetamine and fentanyl were found on the dollar bills
- Fentanyl is 50-100 times stronger than morphine and up to 50 times stronger than heroin
- Last year, overdoses involving fentanyl and other synthetic opioids surpassed 71,000 up 23 percent from the year before
Tennessee law enforcement officials are warning local residents not to pick up folded dollar bills as they may contain fentanyl or meth amid fears that children could find them on floor.
The Perry County Sherriff’s Office, located in-between Memphis and Nashville, raised concerns on social media, sharing that two reported incidents involved finding ‘a white powdery substance’ inside folded dollars bells that were on the ground of a local gas station.
The substance was sent to a laboratory for tests, which came to the conclusion that traces of methamphetamine and fentanyl were found on the bills, according to the sheriff’s office statement on Facebook.
‘This is very dangerous, folks! Please share and educate your children to not pick up the money,’ Sheriff Nick Weems shared on social media.
‘I personally plan to push for legislation for a bill that would intensify the punishment, if someone is caught using money as a carrying pouch for such poison. It enrages me as a father and the Sheriff, that people can act so carelessly and have no regard for others well being, especially a child,’ he added.
The Perry County Sherriff’s Office warned locals to not touch any folded dollar bills that are found on the floor after two reported incidents of fentanyl appearing in the printed currency
‘I personally plan to push for legislation for a bill that would intensify the punishment, if someone is caught using money as a carrying pouch for such poison,’ said Sheriff Nick Weems (left) of the Perry County’s Sheriff Office. ‘It enrages me as a father and the Sheriff, that people can act so carelessly and have no regard for others well being, especially a child’
Weems further said that he ‘hopes we find the ones responsible’ even though no arrests in relation to both incidents have bee made as of Tuesday afternoon.
The Giles County Sheriff Department’s office also shared a poster warning its own residents on the two incidents over in Perry County.
‘This is very dangerous issue!’ the poster read. ‘Please share and educate your children to not pick up any folded money they may find in or around business playgrounds, etc., without using great caution and even alerting a parent or guardian.’
The Giles County Sheriff’s Department shared a similar warning, telling its residents to ‘please share and educate your children not to pick up any folded money they may find in or around businesses, playgrounds etc., without using great caution and even alerting a parent’
‘The amount of powder shown next to the penny, (if fentanyl laced) is more than enough to kill anyone that it comes into contact with. Be aware and safe!’ it added.
According to the Drug Enforcement Agency (DEA), fentanyl ‘a synthetic opioid that is 50-100 times stronger than morphine.’ The narcotic is also up to 50 times stronger than heroin, the agency further reported.
It is commonly mixed up with other drugs, most commonly cocaine.
More than 107,000 Americans died of drug overdoses last year, setting another tragic record in the nation’s escalating overdose epidemic, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reported in May.
The provisional 2021 total translates to roughly one U.S. overdose death every five minutes. It marked a 15 percent increase from the previous record, set the year before. The CDC reviews death certificates and then makes an estimate to account for delayed and incomplete reporting.
Fentanyl is 50-100 times stronger than morphine and also up to 50 times stronger than heroin
Dr. Nora Volkow, director of the National Institute on Drug Abuse, called the latest numbers ‘truly staggering.’
The White House issued a statement last month calling the accelerating pace of overdose deaths ‘unacceptable’ and promoting its recently announced national drug control strategy. It calls for measures like connecting more people to treatment, disrupting drug trafficking and expanding access to the overdose-reversing medication naloxone.
U.S. overdose deaths have risen most years for more than two decades. The increase began in the 1990s with overdoses involving opioid painkillers, followed by waves of deaths led by other opioids like heroin and — most recently — illicit fentanyl.
Last year, overdoses involving fentanyl and other synthetic opioids surpassed 71,000 up 23 percent from the year before. There also was a 23 percent increase in deaths involving cocaine and a 34 percent increase in deaths involving meth and other stimulants.
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