California opioid crisis

Since 2017, the number of fatalities in California attributable to synthetic opioids has increased by 1,027%. Fentanyl has been to blame for 20% of deaths among California's teenagers and young adults. California is taking legal efforts to tackle the opioid issue, including patrols, assistance grants, and education.

Fatal overdoses
Over 80,000 Americans may have fatally overdosed on opioids in 2021, with more than 11,200 of those fatalities occurring in California, as reported by the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Fentanyl is responsible for the death of 20% of teens and young adults in California (15 - 24). According to California Health Policy Strategies statistics, drug overdoses are now two to three times more fatal than state car accidents. The number of California state fatalities linked to synthetic opioids has climbed by 1,027% since 2017.

San Francisco has the highest per capita fatal OD rate compared to four neighboring counties. Of the 1,510 overdose deaths occurring in the region, 57% belong to San Francisco. According to a preliminary estimate from the San Francisco Medical Examiner office, there were 346 unintentional overdose fatalities in San Francisco throughout the initial five months of 2023, a rise of more than 40% over the identical period in 2018. According to the data, fentanyl is responsible for roughly 80% of all unintentional fatal overdoses in the city. In the first four months of 2023, 268 people died from unintentional overdoses in San Francisco, according to an investigation by the medical examiner. All of the fentanyl was discovered in the Tenderloin region of San Francisco.

Legal actions
Senate Bill 10, also known as "Melanie’s Law," was a bill heard by the California Senate in 2023. The bill was named after 15 years old Melanie Ramos, a student at Hollywood's Helen Bernstein High School who passed away at school in September 2022 from what was thought to be a fentanyl overdose. Her body was discovered in one of the campus bathrooms by her friend's stepfather after she had been reported missing for eight hours, according to a lawsuit filed by her family. By expanding resources, the bill attempts to prevent fentanyl overdoses on campuses across the state. As part of a school safety plan, the legislation would compel schools to devise an action plan for student opioid overdoses. This can entail educating staff on how to give medicines like Narcan to alleviate the symptoms of an opioid overdose.

From the beginning of May through the middle of June, California highway patrol (CHP) officers seized in San Francisco as much fentanyl as it could be the direct cause of more than 2 million fatal overdoses. The governor's office stated that the quantity, being over 4 kilograms, was sufficient to kill the population of San Francisco three times over. The seizure was conducted as a part of Gavin Newsom's plan, which combats the spread of fentanyl and bright and tries to enhance the public health and safety in San Francisco.

Attorney General Rob Bonta stated on 9 June 2023 that Walgreens, CVS, and two pharmaceutical companies would have to pay a total of $17.3 billion to the state of California as part of a settlement for their involvement in the opioid crisis. Despite the drug issues in the San Francisco city, community-led harm-reduction initiatives have been stopped by Newsom and some local officials. Tenderloin Center, which was designed as a temporary harm-reduction measure, was planned to be replaced by 12 smaller “wellness hubs” located around the city. These hubs were designed to offer "health and shelter services", besides allowing "supervised drug use" so that overdose deaths are prevented.

Legislation that would have permitted controlled drug-use facilities in three Californian cities, including San Francisco, was vetoed by Newsom in 2022 summer. Consequently, the plan for the wellness centers became a standstill after San Francisco's city attorney objected that the city would end up being held heavily liable, a decision which made the non-profits seeking for a means to finance the overdose preventive components of their activities without receiving financing from the city.