Saw a documentary on heroin yesterday, scariest drug life cycle I could ever imagine. Dealer with a covered up face talked about how they stamp the bags to market their brand. Two dealers talked about how they step on or lace the product, that's the really scary part. The one slightly less nefarious dealer said new users get low cut/high potency to get them in on that dealer's product, then once the dealer knows them they cut for them farther and farther down. They're so addicted by this point the users chalk it up to tolerance. Other dealer touched on fentanyl and explained why you are hearing about it in the news killing so many people, and would wonder why a dealer would ever use that to cut the product. Said dope fiends crave and will chase high potency, so what he does is in lets say a random batch with XYZ stamp, one bag will get a drop of fentanyl, which will likely OD/kill the person who took it. This bag is ID'ed to the street dealer from the wholesaler to give out at their discretion, usually to someone they don't like or someone "overweight who can probably survive the OD" in doctor drug dealer's medical opinion. Once word gets out among the addicts, they all want the stamp from the back that someone OD'ed on. They have no idea that the potency is normalized for all the other bags anyways, and the dealers play Russian roulette to get the OD rep associated with his batch. The users are so addicted and want to avoid withdraw so badly, the thought of this happening to them doesn't even cross their minds. Not shocking, just really horrifying to hear someone in the supply chain say how this actually works.
Best to your niece and your family,
@FatUncleJerryBuss