“Drug traffickers are continuing their efforts to smuggle sedatives such as xylazine into the United States,” the CBP director said.
Federal agents at the Chicago Air Cargo Facility seized cargo from China, including 18 pounds of xylazine. This is increasingly being discovered in the illicit drug market in the US.
The three cargo arrived on April 12th, heading to homes in Cleveland and Philadelphia, with Customs and the Border Aviation Administration (CBP) announced in a statement on April 16th.
“Drug traffickers are obsessed with attempts to smuggle sedatives such as xylazine into the United States, but through our efforts and vigilance, we will continue to intercept these dangerous substances at our ports of entry before causing harm to our communities.”
Xylazine, also known as “Tranq” and “zombie drugs,” is a veterinary medicine that acts as a sedative when administered to animals such as cows, sheep, and horses during diagnostic and surgical procedures. Xylazine is not a US controlled substance, but it is not approved for use on people, according to the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
The US Drug Enforcement Agency (DEA) warns that xylazine is “fatal” in the United States because it has longer psychoactive effects than fentanyl alone, increasing the risk of overdose deaths.
Mexico-based Sinaloa and Jalisco Cartels are known to source precursors of the chemicals from China before these chemicals were produced into fentanyl. Last year, the House Selection Committee on the Communist Party of China warned in a report that Chinese-produced xylazine is “proliferating rapidly across the United States.”
In October 2023, the China-based Hanhong Medical Technology Company was licensed and charged with exporting large quantities of fentanyl precursors and non-orbital additives containing xylazine to the United States and Mexico.
Two recent criminal cases involving xylazine have been carried out in New York.
On April 11, the DEA announced the indictment of two men allegedly operating a drug packaging and distribution factory in an apartment in Upper Manhattan’s Inwood district. Local law enforcement officials discovered “potentially deadly drug mixtures, bags of powdered cocaine and xylazine, and thousands of glassine envelopes in veterinary grade bottles,” according to a statement.
“These drug traffickers were preparing to flood New York City with deadly toxic poisons – fentanyl and xylazine, without considering the life of New York State Police Department (NYPD) Chairman Jessica S. Tish (NYPD) for profit, using the fatal poisons – fentanyl and xylazine, to flood New York City with deadly toxic poisons – fentanyl and xylazine,” the statement said in the statement.
According to the DEA, the couple was indicted on February 7, 2024 at Central Islip after allegedly selling 270 grams of fentanyl between May 2023 and January 2024 between May 2023 and January 2024. The agency said several fentanyl doses that were positive for xylazine have been tested.
On April 17, NYPD’s District 62 used social media platform X to warn locals about xylazine.
“Xylazine, or “Tranq,” was recently discovered in NYC’s drug supply. This particular drug is usually paired with fentanyl,” he wrote before warning that it can cause severe skin wounds, drowsiness, reactions, hypotension and a lower heart rate.
In recent years, some states have enacted laws regulating the use of xylazine in South Dakota, Pennsylvania, Ohio and West Virginia.
A bipartisan group of lawmakers introduced the illegal xylazine law in February, fighting in both the House and Senate. The act will make xylazine a Schedule III controlled substance, allowing the DEA to track production to prevent diversions to illegal markets.
“Illegal xylazine contributes to the national drug outbreak and causes overdose deaths in communities across the country,” Sen. Catherine Cortez Masto (D-Nev.) and Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa), who led the Senate bill, said in a statement at the time.
“This bipartisan bill will enable veterinarians, ranchers and beef to continue access to drugs for legal animal treatment, while providing new tools to recognize the deadly threat of xylazine and combat the spread of law enforcement,” Grassley said.
