Despite the death and destruction already wreaked by Harris’s crisis, we are still learning the true scale of the devastation. Many crimes go unreported to law enforcement or by the media. Horrifyingly, below is only the beginning of how Harris’s crisis is hurting people in Montana.
The number of overdose deaths caused by fentanyl in Montana grew by 520 percent from 2019 (10) to 2021 (62).
The Northwest Montana Drug Task Force, responsible for covering six counties, including Lincoln, Lake and Flathead, equaling roughly 17,600 square miles, made 56 fentanyl-related arrests in 2022 and removed more than $2 million in illicit drugs from communities.
Throughout Montana, there were 488 opioid seizures by law enforcement in 2021, nearly double the number in 2017, according to the Montana Board of Crime Control.