McGruff the Crime Dog® smells big crime with the sale of fake pills in the age of fentanyl.

It is estimated that 90% of fake pills found on social media contain fentanyl. Often hidden behind filters, ads, and other smoke screens, these transactions may seem harmless, but they are often deadly. The National Crime Prevention Council (NCPC) and the United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) have produced new video PSAs as the latest installment of the award-winning Go For Real™ campaign. The PSAs highlight the unsafe conditions fake pills are made in and how just one pill could include a deadly amount of fentanyl that could instantly cost a young person their life.

More than 6 billion possibly lethal doses of fentanyl were seized by federal law enforcement at the U.S. border in the government’s 2023 year, which ended in September 2023. It was enough to kill all 330 million Americans 18 times — but plenty more has made it into the country undetected.

The latest Centers for Disease Control and Prevention data indicated that 109,000 people died from drug overdoses in 2022, with 70% of deaths tied to a synthetic opioid such as fentanyl.

These PSAs urge viewers to “Think Again” before buying pills from social media. More information is available at McGruffPSA.org.