Fentanyl test strips are being used by drug dealers to advertise 'clean pills'

Fentanyl test strips are sold online and easily obtained free from many public health departments. They’re touted as a harm reduction tool to help drug users determine whether fentanyl is present in a pill or powder.

But Sheriff’s Deputy Patrick Craven, the lead detective of the newly formed opioid response team in rural Placer County, California, warns that the test strips are now being used by drug dealers who post photos on social media showing “negative” test results to advertise that their drugs are “clean.”

Asked if users can trust that information, Craven said, “Absolutely not.”

Fentanyl test strips can’t offer accurate results unless an entire pill or batch of powder is tested, something most users don’t know how to do — or don’t want to do.

“Most people are not going to go and spend money on drugs only to test them and then find out, ‘I can’t use this,’” Craven said.

Last year the Drug Enforcement Administration seized more than 77 million fentanyl pills and nearly 12,000 pounds of fentanyl powder, the most fentanyl seized by the DEA in a single year. According to the agency, that’s more than 386 million deadly doses of fentanyl — enough to kill every American.

The DEA also says that fentanyl pills are only growing more potent. In 2023, laboratory tests showed that 7 out of 10 pills tested contained a potentially deadly dose of fentanyl, a steady increase from 4 out of 10 pills in 2021 and 6 out of 10 in 2022. Just two milligrams is considered a deadly dose — an amount that fits on the tip of a pencil.

Craven said the danger to users is made still worse by a lack of quality control. Counterfeit versions of Xanax, Oxycontin and Percocet that contain fentanyl have flooded the market, and the level of the deadly synthetic opioid can vary widely from pill to pill.

“No pill is processed and made in the same way, and therefore they don’t contain even amounts of fentanyl,” Craven said.

Fentanyl test strips were intended as a public health measure to address the recent surge in overdoses, which has finally started to subside. Health departments nationwide have spent millions of dollars to provide free test strips. In New York, the state health department website walks users through how to test their drugs. Chicago has vending machines to dispense the strips.

“Our hope is that using the fentanyl strip will have prevented people from overdose,” Chicago Public Health Commissioner Simbo Ige said.

But they are hardly a failsafe. If a user cuts up a pill and tests just one part of it, said Craven, it could come back negative for fentanyl, while the rest of the pill or the batch contained a deadly amount.

And, said Craven, they can also be used by dealers to give customers a false sense of security.

In 2022, Craven led the investigation into the fatal fentanyl poisoning of 15-year-old Jewels Wolf.

Investigators found that Nathaniel Cabacungan, 20, met Wolf on social media, and then provided the counterfeit Percocet pill that killed her. Cabacungan became the first dealer in California to be convicted of murder for providing fentanyl-laced pills.

Cabacungan had a history of ensuring customers that his pills did not contain fentanyl, according to investigators and to text exchanges reviewed by NBC News.

“Nathaniel Cabacungan put out there that his pills did not contain fentanyl, and that was not the case,” Craven said.

Two years later, Craven said that he now sees posts on social media sites and messaging apps in which dealers use test strips to advertise to potential drug buyers that what they’re selling is fentanyl free.

Wolf’s mother Regina Chavez said parents and young people need to understand that test strips can provide “a false sense of security” because of the way they’re being used. Chavez believes her daughter’s death was an accident.

“She wouldn’t have intentionally done this,” Chavez said. “She was planning on getting her first job. She was about to start studying to get her driving permit. She was thinking about what she wanted to do for career.”

Chavez wants people to know test strip results can be trusted only if a user is testing the entire pill or batch themselves. She said talking about her daughter Jewels is how she can keep her memory alive, and try to help others.

“The solace that I take from her death is ... my baby is still doing amazing things, even after she’s gone, to help save our communities, to help save our children.”