Don’t ‘pick up any folded money’: The bill could be deadly, Tennessee sheriff warns

From Penn Live.com (June 10):

A sheriff in Tennessee has issued a public safety warning about folded dollar bills.

The Giles County Sheriff’s Department said on social media that his office has investigated two recent incidents where a folded dollar bill was found on the floor at a gas station.

“When it was found and picked up, the person discovered a white powdery substance inside. The substance was later tested and was positive for methamphetamine and fentanyl.”

Even a very small amount of fentanyl - far smaller than the size of a penny - is enough to kill anyone, the sheriff said alongside a photo of a penny with a lethal amount of the drug.

This is [a] very dangerous issue. Please share and educate your children to not pick up any folded money they may find in or around businesses, playgrounds, etc., without using great caution and even alerting a parent or guardian.”

Kavita Babu, professor of Emergency Medicine at UMass Chan Medical School said in an editorial on PennLive, “Milligram per milligram, fentanyl is roughly 50 times more potent than heroin and 100 times more potent than morphine.”

Overdose victims are often unaware that the drugs they ingested were laced with fentanyl. [source]

Scary. I wonder if someone putting fentanyl in folded money is deliberate. Some sort of sick prank.