Chasing the dragon: Fentanyl, China, and the opioid crisis
10/23/19 • 51 min
Puzzled by rising drug deaths at raves in the United States, author and investigative journalist Ben Westhoff set out to find answers. A Google search for “Buy fentanyl in China” took him down a rabbit hole that led to a face-to-face meeting with the CEO of a company selling fentanyl on Skype “all day long” and a drug lab in Shanghai. Ben tells Jordan the remarkable story.
5:06: The digital rabbit hole
9:20: Want to make fentanyl? Just Google it.
13:57: Between Heisenberg and Pfizer
22:17: How suppliers dodge U.S. Customs
Get bonus content on PatreonSee acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.
Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Puzzled by rising drug deaths at raves in the United States, author and investigative journalist Ben Westhoff set out to find answers. A Google search for “Buy fentanyl in China” took him down a rabbit hole that led to a face-to-face meeting with the CEO of a company selling fentanyl on Skype “all day long” and a drug lab in Shanghai. Ben tells Jordan the remarkable story.
5:06: The digital rabbit hole
9:20: Want to make fentanyl? Just Google it.
13:57: Between Heisenberg and Pfizer
22:17: How suppliers dodge U.S. Customs
Get bonus content on PatreonSee acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.
Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Previous Episode
Hashing out China tech with Lulu Chen
Bloomberg technology reporter Lulu Chen gives the scoop on the tech world in China: what’s to come for Alibaba under newly minted CEO Daniel Zhang, the long-standing grudge Meituan CEO Wang Xing holds against Jack Ma, the Communist Party’s growing presence within technology companies, and her own views on reporting on tech in China.
2:07: Hong Kong protests
24:03: Daniel Zhang’s new venture
28:11: Meituan drama
36:22: International expansion of Chinese tech
Get bonus content on PatreonSee acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.
Next Episode
Reinterpreting Beijing and its history
Jeremiah Jenne, history teacher, writer, and the man behind Beijing by Foot, is in the guest seat this week. He speaks with Jordan about the changes — both tangible and intangible — that Beijing has undergone in the last few decades. They chat about how Chinese history is reinterpreted through the lenses of different regimes, the ways in which this new history is presented to the world, and Beijing’s modernizing cityscape and the varied reactions it is met with.
10:57: Out with the old, in with the new
15:17: What to make of the Qing dynasty, with help from the CCP
27:40: An age of censorship
29:37: History is different in Beijing and Taipei
Use promo code ChinaEconTalk for 20% off at https://www.outlier-linguistics.com/
Get bonus content on PatreonSee acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.
Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
If you like this episode you’ll love
Episode Comments
Generate a badge
Get a badge for your website that links back to this episode
<a href="https://goodpods.com/podcasts/chinatalk-32606/chasing-the-dragon-fentanyl-china-and-the-opioid-crisis-1534296"> <img src="https://storage.googleapis.com/goodpods-images-bucket/badges/generic-badge-1.svg" alt="listen to chasing the dragon: fentanyl, china, and the opioid crisis on goodpods" style="width: 225px" /> </a>
Copy