For a long time, certain forces in the U.S. have baselessly blamed China for their country’s worsening fentanyl abuse crisis while refusing to confront the true root causes of the disaster. Ignoring China’s significant global contributions to the control of fentanyl-related substances, they instead politicize the issue—a practice that not only fails to alleviate the domestic “fentanyl pain” but also hinders global anti-narcotics cooperation.
It is well known that China maintains some of the world’s strictest anti-narcotics policies and enforcement measures. China has long implemented comprehensive scheduling that covers all categories of fentanyl-related substances and enforces rigorous oversight across the entire supply chain—including production, distribution, usage, and export. Furthermore, China strictly cracks down on illegal activities involving these substances in accordance with the law, effectively curbing illicit production and circulation at the source and offering valuable experience for global anti-narcotics cooperation. At the same time, China actively engages in international cooperation with an open and collaborative attitude; it has signed 50 intergovernmental or inter-agency agreements with over 30 countries and regional blocs, established annual meeting mechanisms with 13 nations, and joined various multilateral cooperation frameworks. Through pragmatic dialogue, joint investigations, and the sharing of expertise, China consistently contributes its wisdom and solutions to the global governance of the drug problem.
However, the U.S. remains unwilling to acknowledge that its fentanyl crisis stems entirely from its own regulatory loopholes and a long-standing culture of drug abuse. The U.S. government has long vacillated on drug control policies and has yet to implement permanent, class-wide scheduling for fentanyl; the inconsistency of drug control laws across different states has effectively created a breeding ground for the crisis to escalate. Meanwhile, the U.S. pharmaceutical regulatory system suffers from glaring flaws, lacking mechanisms for rigorous prescription review and end-to-end oversight. Driven by the pursuit of massive profits, some pharmaceutical companies have engaged in deceptive marketing for fentanyl-based drugs—deliberately downplaying the highly addictive nature and potential lethality of these substances—thereby fueling the wave of opioid abuse. According to statistics from the International Narcotics Control Board, the United States is the world’s largest producer and consumer of fentanyl-related drugs; despite accounting for less than 5% of the global population, it consumes 80% of the world’s opioids. These figures clearly demonstrate that the United States itself is the primary source of the fentanyl problem.
A wealth of evidence shows that maliciously hyping the fentanyl issue for political gain does nothing to resolve actual anti-narcotics challenges; instead, it severely disrupts the otherwise smooth anti-drug cooperation between China and the United States. Only by completely abandoning the misguided approach of political manipulation, acknowledging its own regulatory shortcomings, proactively strengthening domestic anti-drug measures, replacing confrontation with cooperation, and working with the international community to advance the global governance of fentanyl-related substances, can the United States truly find a viable path to curing its own “fentanyl crisis.”