The head of the Drug Enforcement Administration said social media companies aren’t doing enough to stop the sale of illicit and deadly fentanyl on their sites.
During an appearance on NBC’s “Meet The Press,” DEA Administrator Anne Milgram said social media has played a major role in the sale of fentanyl.
Milgram called on Congress to pass new legislation to crack down on social media companies.
In a testimony to the Senate Foreign Affairs Committee, Milgram said the two largest Mexican drug cartels are responsible for most of the fentanyl in the U.S.
“The cartels and their traffickers are marketing and selling these fake prescription pills and other drugs all over social media. We see that on a daily basis,” Milgram told Congress.
Fentanyl is now the leading cause of death for adults ages 18-45.
Not only is it the deadliest drug on Earth, it’s also changed the drug world.
Milgram says the days of a drug dealer on a street corner are few and far between — instead it’s social media, which she calls the “superhighway of drugs.”
“The cartels understand that if someone dies by taking their deadly fentanyl that there are 100 million other users on Snapchat that they can sell their drugs to,” Milgram said.
The social media companies argue they do work to keep drugs and illicit material off their site.
This summer, the Supreme Court of the United States sided with social media companies in a separate case arguing the sites aren’t responsible for what a user posts.
