- The new job of Dr. Hugo López-Gatell is to lead the section “Addictions and collective health” every Tuesday within AMLO’s morning conference.
- In his first speech, he said that fentanyl is a potentially addictive substance from the first time it is used and can cause death.
- He indicated that it is 100 times more effective than morphine and 50 times more than heroin.
Recently, the issue of fentanyl in Mexico for being a potentially addictive substance from the first time it is used. In this sense, the undersecretary for Prevention and Health Promotion, Hugo López-Gatell Ramírez, warned that in relatively moderate doses it can have serious effects on health and cause death.
Main consequences of its consumption
He also specified that the consumption of fentanyl can cause in some cases analgesia, drowsiness, nausea, and constipation; in others, euphoria, muscle rigidity, hallucinations, and involuntary movements, as well as delirium, coma, respiratory depression, and even death.
He assured that the fentanyl epidemic is imported and the consumption of this substance in Mexico does not compare with the public health problem in the United States. In 2021, our country registered 19 deaths, while in the American Union there were 80,411 deaths.
Fentanyl is one of the most dangerous drugs due to its potential to generate addiction and lead to the death of those who consume it. In the Government of Mexico we are determined to solve this public health problem with an emphasis on prevention. pic.twitter.com/nfghp7uISE
— Hugo López-Gatell Ramírez (@HLGatell) April 11, 2023
However, I believe that there must be “an intense anticipation in prevention”, which is why the campaign includes raising awareness of the problem with messages directed mainly to teaching staff, guidance and training on what to do in a case of addiction, skills and alternatives for Help in the health system. All this, with the support of specialists in mental health, psychiatry and psychology.
He specified that this measure has information and communication purposes on the risks related to the consumption of psychoactive substances, and the educational system is an antenna to detect this problem.
Mexico should not approve the free sale of naloxone as in the United States
He explained that there is a medicine called naloxone that counteracts the effects of fentanyl and in Mexico there is strong pressure from interest groups to incorporate naloxone, even when the consumption of the opioid (fentanyl) is very low. The strategy should focus on prevention.
He added that he Fentanyl was originally designed as a medication to treat intense pain in cases of surgery or to control this symptom that is difficult to treat with other substances in serious diseases such as cancer with metastases or neurological conditions. It is 100 times more effective than morphine and 50 times more than heroin.
Its medical use is in oral, injectable or patch form. The one for illegal use comes in multiple presentations such as white powder, pills, capsules and candies, and with different names.
Current panorama of addictions
He stated that addictions in general are a chronic social and health problem. Its main characteristic is that the person begins to have a compulsive search for substance use that goes beyond the will. It is a neurological and psychosocial matter, since those who suffer from this problem “do not decide when they consume the substance, how much they consume it, what substance and who provides it, it is a compulsion to use it.”
The consumption of psychoactive substances alters areas of the brain responsible for the mechanisms of satisfaction, reward and the sensation of physical and emotional well-being.
In addition, the person has behaviors of isolation and rejection, even of the help that family members, friends, and the community can provide. They also cause loss of appetite and lack of interest in hydration, which are part of the damage to health.
He said that it is important to consider that the problem of psychoactive substance abuse has to do with the loss of opportunities and spaces for social integration at school, work or within the family, and that social violence is the consequence of an economic model with deep inequality; Therefore, it is vital to offer young people alternatives for inclusion and integration that avoid their approach to drugs.
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