All month, the Dallas Morning News has put a spotlight on fentanyl and its deadly grip on North Texas, publishing stories each day in September.
NBC 5 Anchor Brittney Johnson sat down with the paper's executive editor to discuss the series Deadly Fake. The multimedia project explores fentanyl's impact on families and institutions across our community and the race for solutions to save lives.
"Fentanyl is the deadliest drug ever created. And you stop to think about that," said Dallas Morning News Executive Editor Katrice Hardy.
Hardy described the moment it became clear that now is the time to focus on Fentanyl.
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"What resonated for us was this one story in particular about this one school in Carrolton where three middle school students. I mean, these kids are, you know, just barely teenagers, died in one school year. And a number of others had overdosed some multiple times," she said.
A Dallas Morning News reporter received the tip and broke the story about the deaths and fentanyl crisis in Carrollton ISD.
"It was mind-boggling to us. This took precedence for us because of the age of the people involved," Hardy explained.
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Hardy says the original team of three reporters grew to a group of 30 staff members digging up stories, talking to grieving parents and overdose survivors, following DEA agents tracking dealers and researchers racing to make a vaccine.
"Five Texans a day died from fentanyl last year. Every institution that is important to our community thriving, from the hospitals to the schools, from our government entities, public safety systems, everybody is dealing with this," Hardy said.
Hardy explained that the series has been a huge undertaking and described the impact on reporters.
"They have lost sleep, trying to make sure that these stories were told in the right tone and the right manner.
Because they want people to understand how devastating this is, but also how nuanced this can be for some communities," she said.
But the overwhelming response proves it has been worth it.
"People have just said, you know, now I'm going to talk to my grandkids about this," Hardy said. "They were shocked by the fact that this is not a socio-economic status thing. It's not, you know, ethnic, race. Age doesn't have anything to do with it. It affects every community."
And while September is coming to an end, Hardy says their commitment to covering fentanyl must continue.
"I hope that this is not a taboo conversation for families anymore and for schools anymore. I hope our state will continue to take some steps to one day become a leader in fighting fentanyl," Hardy said.
The Dallas Morning News team put together a resource list for the community. You can see it and read the full series, Deadly Fake, here.
