Urge designation of illicit fentanyl a weapon of mass destruction

As Adopted by the Senate

136th
General Assembly

Regular
Session
S. C. R. No. 1

2025-2026

Senator
Johnson

Cosponsors:
Senators Schaffer, Patton, Weinstein, Brenner, Cirino, Cutrona,
Gavarone, Koehler, Landis, Manning, O'Brien, Reineke, Reynolds,
Roegner, Romanchuk, Timken

A
c o n c u r r e n t R E S O L U T I O N

To
urge the 119th Congress to introduce and pass legislation similar to
the Stop Our Scourge Act of 2023, directing the Secretary of Homeland
Security to designate illicit fentanyl as a weapon of mass
destruction.

BE
IT RESOLVED BY THE SENATE OF THE STATE OF OHIO (THE HOUSE OF
REPRESENTATIVES CONCURRING):

WHEREAS,
According to the United States Drug Enforcement Administration,
fentanyl is a synthetic opioid fifty times more potent than heroin
and one hundred times more potent than morphine; and

WHEREAS,
According to data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention
(CDC), fentanyl has become the number one cause of death for
Americans eighteen to forty-five years of age; and

WHEREAS,
According to the CDC, pharmaceutical fentanyl is prescribed by
physicians and other authorized health care providers to treat severe
pain, especially after surgery or for advanced stage cancer, and may
also be used as an anesthetic or in other hospital or treatment
settings legally; and

WHEREAS,
Illicit fentanyl, both illegally made fentanyl and diverted
pharmaceutical fentanyl, is often distributed through criminal drug
markets in different forms, including liquid or powder, making its
detection complex and its distinction from other drugs increasingly
difficult; and

WHEREAS,
According to the CDC, fentanyl and drugs similar in chemical
structure to fentanyl are being mixed into counterfeit opioid pills,
heroin, cocaine, marijuana, and methamphetamine, and people who use
only non-opioid drugs are more likely to overdose if they are exposed
to drugs mixed with opioids, including fentanyl; and

WHEREAS,
According to the National Center for Health Statistics, overdose
deaths involving synthetic opioids, primarily fentanyl, were
estimated to be 74,702 in 2023; and

WHEREAS,
According to the Ohio Department of Health, fentanyl was involved in
seventy-eight per cent of Ohio's unintentional drug overdose deaths
in 2023; and

WHEREAS,
United States Customs and Border Protection (CBP) seized more than
twenty-one thousand pounds of illicit fentanyl in federal fiscal year
2024; and

WHEREAS,
CBP's fentanyl seizures have increased more than eight hundred per
cent since federal fiscal year 2019; and

WHEREAS,
The dangers of fentanyl are further evidenced by such events as those
in 2002 when, in response to Chechen rebels taking over eight hundred
hostages in a Moscow theater, Russia deployed an unknown gas, later
confirmed by the Russian Health Minister to contain fentanyl-related
compounds, to neutralize the rebels, which resulted in the death of
117 hostages from effects of the gas; now therefore be it

RESOLVED,
That we, the members of the 136th General Assembly of the State of
Ohio, urge the 119th United States Congress to introduce and pass
legislation that is similar to a previous proposal known as the Stop
Our Scourge Act of 2023, directing the United States Secretary of
Homeland Security to designate illicit fentanyl a weapon of mass
destruction; and be it further

RESOLVED,
That the Clerk of the Senate transmit duly authenticated copies of
this resolution to the President Pro Tempore and Secretary of the
United States Senate, Speaker and Clerk of the United States House of
Representatives, members of the Ohio Congressional delegation, and
the news media of Ohio.