Police, doctors debate the danger of touching fentanyl

SANDUSKY — It's a danger to police you've probably heard about — ultra-deadly fentanyl spilled on police officers that make the law officers immediately sick.But is it a real threat? Medical experts say there's no danger of police officers becoming sick if their skin comes in contact with fentanyl power, contradicting a panic that spread after alleged overdose incidents in Ohio.Police officers, however, described incidents in which they believed they became sick after coming into contact with illicit drugs. One such incident took place in Norwalk in December.There's even a planned new bill to protect police officers from the alleged threat. Ohio's two U.S. senators, Sherrod Brown and Rob Portman, have introduced a bill, the Providing Officers with Electronic Resources Act, S. 2763, that would provide grants to pay for portable devices for detecting fentanyl to protect them from accidentally coming into contact with the substance.Possible examplesNews of the possible danger to officers from fentanyl exposure gained exposure after a May 2017 incident involving Officer Chris Green of the East Liverpool Ohio police department.Green allegedly overdosed after brushing off fentanyl powder from his uniform with his hand but was revived with doses of naloxone. Green did not return a telephone call from the Register asking him to discuss the incident.The incident inspired debunking stories at internet sites such as Slate.com and Snopes.com, which quoted medical toxicologists as saying no one can overdose on fentanyl by touching fentanyl powder. The American College of Medical Toxicology issued a statement stating there was no cause for alarm.The incident in Norwalk concerns Sgt. James Montana of the Norwalk Police Department, who reported becoming ill after a Dec. 14, 2017, arrest of a man at Wal-Mart who appeared to have drugs on his person, including powdered heroin.Montana declined an interview, but the department's acting police chief, Mike Conney, spoke to the Register and said Montana reported his face and nose became numb after the officer was exposed to heroin and fentanyl mixed together.Montana did not lose consciousness and did not receive naloxone, Conney said. Drugs were not detected in Montana's blood, Conney said.What do doctors say?The Register spoke about the fentanyl touching worries with Dr. Andrew Stolbach, an associate professor of emergency medicine at Johns Hopkins and a member of the board of the American College of Medical Toxicologists.Stolbach said that if you spill fentanyl on your skin, "it's just not plausible that it would be absorbed."If people could get high from touching it, nobody would bother injecting it, he said. "They would just put it on their skin," Stolbach said.And if it were that toxic, "the dealers would be dropping right and left," Stolbach said. "We're not seeing that happen."It's true there are painkilling patches using fentanyl that are placed on the skin of patients, but it's a special formulation of the drug, and even then, it takes hours for a patient to get a therapeutic dose, he said.Stolbach said he isn't asserting police officers are faking symptoms."The mind is very powerful. People are having real symptoms. It's not that they are fakers or making something up," he said.Brown cited the East Liverpool incident when explaining why his new bill is needed to protect police officers.The Register asked Brown about the claims by toxicologists that the threat doesn't exist.Brown said he wants to know more about such claims."I would rather be safe than sorry, but I will look into what you just said," he said.A spokeswoman for Brown, Jennifer Donahue, said the main purpose of the bill is to allow police to test possible drugs quickly in the field, rather than having to send off samples to drug labs. That can be useful in many ways, she said. For instance, if the drugs can be immediately tested, suspects don't have to be released back into the community while police are waiting for lab results to come back. The Register also asked one of Portman's press spokeswomen, Emily Benavides, why Portman thinks the threat of fentanyl contact is real."Fentanyl presents a clear and present danger not just to the public but to our law enforcement and first responders who are working every day to save lives. Fentanyl is 50 times stronger than heroin and it continues to drive up numbers in fatal overdoses in Ohio. The DEA has issued a nationwide alert on fentanyl as a threat to health and public safety and taking precautions to prevent unnecessary exposure to this deadly drug is simply common sense," she said.Reach reporter Tom Jackson at jackson@sanduskyregister.com and follow him on Twitter @jacksontom.This Wednesday, April 26, 2006 file photo shows different brands and dosages of Fentanyl patches, marked with warnings about non-precribed uses in St. Louis. Fentanyl is a narcotic that is typically administered to people in chronic pain, including end-stage cancer patients. It is also used as an anesthetic. It is considered 80 times more powerful than morphine and can kill by inhibiting breathing. (AP Photo/Tom Gannam)