In 2021, over 70,000 Americans died of fentanyl overdoses. From 2015 to 2021, fentanyl overdose deaths in the U.S. have risen by roughly 700%, and have become the leading cause of death for Americans between the ages of 18 and 45. The DEA has found that 70% of seized fentanyl pills contain a potentially lethal dose, and in the year 2023 alone, the agency intercepted enough fentanyl to kill the entire population of the United States.

 

More than just statistics, the opioid epidemic, magnified by the recent wave of fentanyl overdoses, has devastated American communities, primarily in rural areas. As Americans lose their friends and loved ones, many have demanded that the U.S. government tackle the issue head-on, in order to prevent more Americans from dying en masse. Many politicians vying to win votes in crucial small towns have made dealing with the fentanyl crisis a key issue in their policy agenda.

 

Fentanyl is a depressant, an opioid, with pain relief effects similar to morphine or heroin. However, what makes fentanyl so much deadlier than other common drugs is its potent strength. Fentanyl is 100 times more powerful than morphine, meaning that it can only be used in very small amounts to avoid overdose. However, due to the difficulty of measuring such small portions of the drug, overdoses are common, with just two milligrams of fentanyl being enough to be fatal. With fentanyl becoming more popular amongst opioid addicts, primarily for its cheapness compared to heroin, overdose deaths are only expected to increase. Thus, many officials are desperately looking to stop the drug at its primary source — China. 

 

In the weeks leading up to Xi Jinping and Joe Biden’s summit in San Francisco, the U.S. administration was hoping to convince China to help crack down on the exportation of fentanyl and fentanyl ingredients from the Asian nation. While much of America’s fentanyl does come from its southern border with Mexico through foreign drug cartels, they are often supplied by Chinese sellers, who have the ample resources necessary to manufacture the synthetic opioid. The Biden administration sought to reduce China’s role in fentanyl operations, with Beijing hoping to renegotiate restrictions on American investment in high-tech Chinese industries, as well as to have the U.S. naval presence in the South China Sea reduced in return. White House insiders, meanwhile, claimed that the U.S. was hoping to establish an American-Chinese commission to curb fentanyl production and distribution in China. Republicans in Congress also urged Biden to push the fentanyl issue and ways to combat it during the San Francisco summit, with many having a disproportionate amount of their constituents exposed to opioids. 

 

While a far greater part of the talks between Xi and Biden concerned pressing military issues in the South China Sea, the two leaders came to a favorable agreement regarding the fentanyl crisis. The Chinese president said that the CCP would mitigate the exportation of fentanyl ingredients from China to Latin America, specifically by going after Chinese chemical companies that manufactured fentanyl-related items. In exchange, the U.S. lifted sanctions on the Institute of Forensic Science, a police institute inside China’s Ministry of Public Security that the United States accused of human rights abuses against China’s ethnic Uyghur minority in 2020. This agreement was a highlight of the productive summit for curbing the fentanyl crisis in the United States.

 

Xi and Biden’s agreement on fentanyl strengthened US-China relations and presented another situation where cooperation was needed to find a solution. While the two nations have a history of economic competition, they were still able to come up with plans that benefitted both sides. Further cooperation between the two on the topic of fentanyl has already occurred since the summit through talks held in Beijing in February of this year, with more agreements expected in the future. The agreement, as well as the summit in general, proved that the two powerful nations could find some common ground and dialogue about important issues. 

Of course, there is still the question of whether or not the CCP will effectively follow through with its promises. While China does appear to be cracking down on the manufacturers and exporters of fentanyl ingredients, it’s still unknown if these efforts are thorough enough to lead to a mitigation of overdose deaths in the US. If there is a noticeable reduction, Washington and Beijing may see a slight easing of relations, with one of the many sharp edges of the two countries' multidimensional relationship being dulled. If overdose rates stay the same, or even continue to climb, however, the U.S. may have yet another grievance against China, tensing up relations and possibly increasing calls for less diplomatic solutions, such as taking military action in Mexico, in order to stop fentanyl supply lines at their vector, rather than their source. Only time will tell whether this cooperative agreement at a productive summit will age like wine, or like milk. 

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April, 2024