As part of its national ad campaign, the Mexican government is using videos from Philadelphia’s Kensington neighborhood to discourage young people from using drugs.
The Washington Examiner writes, On Tuesday, Mexican President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador’s spokesman, Jesus Ramirez, announced the ad series via Twitter. In the ads, homeless people slump against walls and live in tent encampments, along with open-air drug users.
According to the Twitter ad titled “Crystal,” meth “finishes you off quickly, removes hunger and tiredness, and causes hallucinations and psychosis. Meth damages both the body and the mind.” The ad shows drug users hunched over, slumping against walls on Kensington Avenue.
Philadelphia’s Kensington neighborhood is known for its opioid crisis, but the mayor’s office said drugs are a widespread issue.
“The opioid and overdose crisis in Philadelphia is part of a national and even international epidemic, and we agree it is important for everyone to understand, as this video notes, that all street drugs now present an elevated risk of overdose because of fentanyl’s extreme prevalence,” a spokesperson for Mayor Jim Kenney (D) said in a statement to the Associated Press.
Kenney added that it is always hard to see the neighborhood portrayed in a negative light, stating that “no neighborhood, and no person, should be defined by this tragic and widespread crisis.”
Overdose deaths in Philadelphia reached 1,276 last year, a record high. Kenney has been known to support supervised injection sites. In an effort to curb the scourge of overdose deaths, advocates have praised these sites. Critics, however, argue that safe injection sites perpetuate illegal drug use and burden neighborhoods.
During fiscal 2022, Customs and Border Protection seized more than 14,700 pounds of fentanyl – an increase from fiscal 2017, when 2,000 pounds were seized.
The primary manufacturers and distributors of methamphetamine and hard narcotics in US cities are Mexican drug trafficking organizations, according to a fact sheet by the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA).
Something needs to be done to reform our broken system and protect our citizens in order to stem the flow of drugs into our country. The Mexican government’s use of footage from Philadelphia’s Kensington neighborhood is downright infuriating considering that they continue to produce and ship the drugs that are ravaging our communities. It’s time for them to take responsibility and help us secure the border so that we can put an end to this crisis.
