What if the cravings were never a character flaw — just a misfiring survival signal? After three decades and twelve rehab attempts, a neuroscientist drew me a diagram that changed everything. This episode covers the real brain science of opioid addiction, why withdrawal feels like dying, what Sublocade did that nothing else could, and the village of people who refused to give up on me when I had given up on myself.

Fentanyl is 100 times more potent than morphine. Xylazine — tranq dope — rots flesh and defeats Narcan. Nitazenes are up to 40 times stronger than fentanyl and barely detectable on existing test strips. The street drug supply in 2025 is not the supply you think you know.

In this episode of The Loudness McEvil Symposium, host Jason MacLeod — a 30-year opioid addict, former fentanyl user, and now 2+ years sober — breaks down exactly what is in the current North American drug supply, how it got there, and why people are dying who aren't using any more than they always did.

This is not an outside perspective. In 2017, heroin disappeared from the supply and got replaced by fentanyl — without warning, without consent, overnight. People he knew died in that transition. This episode is the story of what happened, what's come since, and what's coming next.

Covered in this episode:

→ The history of illicit fentanyl and how it replaced heroin in the supply chain

→ Counterfeit M30 pills and the hot spot problem killing people who think they know their dose

→ Carfentanil — 10,000 times stronger than morphine, already in the streets

→ Xylazine (tranq dope): the veterinary sedative causing flesh-rotting wounds that Narcan cannot reverse

→ Nitazenes: the next wave of synthetic opioids, already detected across North America

→ Why overdose deaths are rising not because people are using more, but because the supply is incomparably more dangerous

→ What this means for harm reduction, naloxone, and fentanyl test strips

This is Part 3 of the Loudness McEvil Symposium Opioid Series. Part 1 covers the 5,000-year history of opioids. Part 2 covers the crimes of Purdue Pharma, the Sackler family, and McKinsey. Part 4 covers what actually works in recovery.

If you are in active addiction or love someone who is: please carry naloxone. Please use fentanyl test strips. Please do not use alone.

Naloxone/Narcan access: findtreatment.gov | SAMHSA helpline: 1-800-662-4357

The Loudness McEvil Symposium is a documentary-style podcast about addiction, recovery, survival, and the systems that shape both. Raw, researched, and told from inside the experience.

Keywords: fentanyl, opioid epidemic, xylazine, tranq dope, nitazenes, carfentanil, drug overdose, opioid crisis, harm reduction, naloxone, Narcan, addiction recovery, street drugs, synthetic opioids, opioid addiction, drug supply, fentanyl test strips, opioid overdose, recovery podcast

This isn't a story about corporate greed in the abstract. It's a documented, prosecuted, guilty-pleaded crime — committed by specific people with names, who knew exactly what they were doing.In part 2 of Loudness's opioid series, we get into OxyContin: how Purdue Pharma and the Sackler family built a machine to create as many opioid-dependent people as possible, as fast as possible. The fake "less than 1% addiction" statistic. The 5,000 doctors sent on resort vacations. McKinsey's proposal to pay distributors a rebate for every overdose. The $11 billion quietly moved offshore before the bankruptcy filing.And then: how the prescription epidemic became the heroin epidemic, which became the fentanyl epidemic — a direct causal chain that is still killing people today.Loudness survived it. Hundreds of thousands didn't.Part 3 coming soon: what the street epidemic actually looked like from the inside.The Loudness McEvil Symposium — addiction, homelessness, recovery, and the truth about who actually created this crisis.

REFERENCES:

Books

• Patrick Radden Keefe, Empire of Pain: The Secret History of the Sackler Dynasty (2021) — the essential book on this topic; sourced for the Sackler family history, the blizzard of prescriptions quote, and the milking program details
• Beth Macy, Dopesick: Dealers, Doctors, and the Drug Company that Addicted America (2018) — on the ground-level impact, particularly in Appalachia; adapted into the Hulu series

Court Documents & Legal Sources

• Massachusetts Attorney General's complaint against Purdue Pharma and the Sackler family (2019) — available at mass.gov/ago — source for the MGH funding details, the internal memos, and the "reckless criminals / scum of the earth" Richard Sackler email
• US Department of Justice — Purdue Pharma plea agreement (2020) — justice.gov — source for the admitted fraud and $8.3 billion settlement
• US Bankruptcy Court — Purdue Pharma Chapter 11 proceedings (2019–2021) — pacer.gov
• US Supreme Court — Harrington v. Purdue Pharma (2024) — ruling on the Sackler immunity shield — supremecourt.gov

McKinsey

• ProPublica — "McKinsey Proposed Paying Pharmacy Companies Rebates for OxyContin Overdoses" — propublica.org, November 2020 — the primary source for the per-overdose rebate proposal
• New York Times — "McKinsey Settles for $573 Million Over Role in Opioid Crisis" — nytimes.com, February 2021

The Distributors

• House Energy and Commerce Committee — "Red Flags and Warning Signs Ignored: Opioid Distribution and Enforcement Failures" (2020) — available at energycommerce.house.gov — source for the West Virginia pharmacy statistics
• Washington Post / 60 Minutes joint investigation — "The Drug Industry's Triumph Over the DEA" — washingtonpost.com, October 2017 — on the DEA revolving door
• State AG settlements — National Association of Attorneys General tracking page — naag.org

Russell Portenoy

• Wall Street Journal — "A Doctor's Change of Heart on Painkiller Risks" — wsj.com, December 2012 — Portenoy's public recantation
• ProPublica — "Doctors Who Get Paid by Drug Companies Prescribe More Brand-Name Drugs" — propublica.org (Dollars for Docs database)

The Sackler Names Coming Down

• New Yorker — "The Family That Built an Empire of Pain" — newyorker.com, October 2017 (Patrick Radden Keefe's original article before the book)
• ArtNet News — tracking coverage of museum name removals, 2019–2022 — news.artnet.com