ELMIRA, N.Y. (WENY)-- Fentanyl continues to be a deadly problem across America including Chemung County. It is a synthetic opioid that is 50-100 times stronger than morphine.

The Chemung County Health Director, Police Chief, Coroner's office, Casa-Trinity, and a family who lost a loved one to fentanyl tell WENY News about how it is impacting the community. 

The lethal substance is being used to lace many other drugs and it is impacting the community from children under seventeen to adults seventy years old. 

So many have lost friends and family members to fentanyl. One teen from Elmira, Syiarra Jones, said she lost eleven friends and most recently her brother in 2021. Tyler Kordell Jones was 19 years old when he passed away. He was a former quarterback at Notre Dame High School in Elmira. Syiarra was his cheerleader on the fieldp; now she cheers for him in heaven.

"You can say so much to an addict. Like you have a problem you need help, but it's up to them if they want to change," Syiarra said.

She had a close relationship with her brother and had birthday plans to go away with him before he died. Tyler's mom Tammy Jones said she knew her son was using pot but didn't know he was using harder drugs until later. It's been a year since he's been gone however her heart is forever broken with him no longer in her life.

"A mother knows, it's hard! He started getting clean and he told me 'mom, I gotta stay here for you. I know you need me.' I said 'yeah, you are my world, you're my world buddy. I gotta have you here, I can not live without you,'" she said.

The Chemung County Coroner's office has been seeing an increase in narcotic overdoses. Fentanyl is the greatest offender.  It doesn't discriminate, it impacts teens to seventy-year-olds. They've also seen children affected by it.

"If we are suspicious, narcotics are involved. Then an autopsy will be performed. As part of that, a toxicology will be done. I know on TV it shows they get the tox report back before the commercial break, but in reality, it can take weeks to months.

Casa Trinity in Elmira, a rehab center with facilities throughout the Southern Tier has inpatient and outpatient programs to help individuals with drug addictions. They say their clients think they're only using meth or pot and then test positive for fentanyl too. 

"So it's really just being put in everything. It's pretty scary. They have no idea that that was even in their substance so we are seeing a higher rate of fentanyl in the urine screens," Melinda Hester and Emily Sidoni with Casa Trinity said.

Health Director for Chemung County, Peter Buzzetti believes education, awareness, and working together with other agencies will help save lives. In 2021 the county had 34 deaths related to drugs.

"In 2021, we had 34 total deaths that involved drugs, mixed drugs toxicity. Fifteen of those involved fentanyl, so that's up 44 percent," Buzzetti said.

 Public officials and community advocates say fentanyl is running the gamut. It's in everything and everywhere. It's not just coming from the same source.

"There are so many distribution entities that it's hard to just pinpoint a central location of where the drugs are migrating from," Elmira Police Chief Anthony Alvernaz said.

Jones added her son's autopsy came back and showed the pill he took was laced with 99%  fentanyl. She and her daughter are now advocates and work to spread awareness and educate the community.

Chief Alvernaz says the best weapon to help police get fentanyl off the streets of Elmira is the residents of Elmira and encourages the public to contact the Elmira Police department's tipline at 607-271-4258.