Beginning Wednesday, Harford County will continue its multi-faceted campaign to prevent heroin use, providing information to families that is "startling and essential" through a new series of workshops for parents and their children."This is continuing what we did last year," county government spokesperson Cindy Mumby said. "The presentation will be different, with new information parents will find startling and essential to protecting their children."The first "2016 Heroin Prevention & Awareness Briefing" is scheduled for Wednesday, Oct. 5, at Edgewood High School. Subsequent workshops, which will contain the same information, are set for Thursday, Oct. 13, at C. Milton Wright High and Monday, Oct. 24, at North Harford High.Nearly 1,300 people attended the six workshops last year, Mumby said, and she encouraged people to come again, even if they came last year.The county this year is taking a more regional approach with the sessions, each of which will last about an hour."These are geared to prevention, discouraging anyone from starting this drug," Mumby said. "It wasn't too long ago people thought heroin was not something in my ZIP code, in my child's school, not in my neighborhood. What we've tried to do is change that."As of Thursday, Harford reported 202 overdoses so far this year, 33 of them fatal, according to Cristie Kahler, spokesperson for the Harford County Sheriff's Office, about 65 percent more than at the same time last year. In all of 2015, there were 201 overdoses, 28 of them fatal. The tallies are from responses by law enforcement to 911 calls.Investigators are attributing much of the significant increase in overdoses to synthetic opioids, primarily fentanyl, being cut in the heroin, Capt. Lee Dunbar, of the Harford County Narcotics Task Force, said."It is extremely deadly and far more powerful than heroin," he said.Synthetic dangerThe fentanyl which investigators are finding is the synthetic type, not pharmacy grade, that is being produced in clandestine laboratories mostly in China, Dunbar said."We are finding various types of fentanyl in toxicology reports from the medical examiner's office, when we unfortunately lose a life to heroin or from our investigation in lab results from heroin purchased in undercover investigations," he said.In one of the recent fatal overdoses, the toxicology report indicated three different types of fentanyl were found in the blood stream, Dunbar said.Some heroin users think they are buying straight heroin when they purchase their drugs, Dunbar said. Others have no idea the drug they're buying is laced with fentanyl."The majority in this region here in Baltimore and specifically Harford County, in our interviews with victims, they are under the impression, the vast majority, that it's heroin they're purchasing," Dunbar said.In some cases, he pointed out, it's to the point that users are taking fentanyl laced with heroin."I say that, instead of the other way around, because the vast majority of the product we send off is containing a lot more fentanyl than it is heroin," he said.Among the most dangerous is carfentanil, which has not yet shown up in any of Harford's toxicology reports, "but we're not naive enough" to think that it won't show up in Harford soon, he said."It's the most powerful synthetic opioid on the street right now. It's 10,000 times more potent than morphine," Dunbar said. It's also much cheaper to cut heroin with fentanyl.A kilogram of a synthetic opioid can be bought for $3,500; a raw kilogram of heroin is $60,000 to $70,000, Dunbar said.Cutting the fentanyl into the heroin, then selling it as straight heroin to an unwitting buyer, significantly increases a dealer's profit margin, he added.Prevention efforts"We very much want to see the numbers go down, but we also realize we need to take a prolonged and multi-faceted approach to battle this national epidemic," the county government's Mumby said.While the overdose numbers are increasing, the county's heroin problem isn't necessarily getting worse, she said."It's hard to say 'no' when people are dying, because one death means the problem is getting worse," Mumby said. "At the same time, we believe that through all of our efforts, we've issued a wake-up call to stem the tide, to capture the younger generation of middle-schoolers and high-schoolers by bringing the problem out in the open, acknowledging the problem, by approaching it directly and bring facts and information to parents."Their efforts are difficult to measure, she said."There are things that don't immediately show up in the numbers. How do you measure someone who has said no to drugs?" Mumby asked. "That pays a lifetime of dividend, but it doesn't show up on a chart anywhere."This year's featured speaker at the workshops is John Wammer, of Havre de Grace, an expert on opiate addition and its impact on the brain."The things he's going to talk about parents are going to find very surprising and essential to their understanding of this crisis," Mumby said.Joe Ryan, of the county's Office of Drug Control Policy, will provide parents and students information about where to go, if they suspect their child, or anyone else is using drugs.Among the things Wammer will discuss is how heroin rewires a user's brain."It essentially highjacks development at the place and time when someone first uses heroin," Mumby said, adding it starts with the very first use.As an example, she said, if a user starts at 16 years old, his or her critical thinking skills and development stop there while they are using and they'll continue to think and make judgments of a 16-year-old no matter how long they continue using."The decision-making skills that might encourage someone to stop using heroin are not kicked in if they weren't active before the user started," Mumby said.On the other hand, she said, a user's ability to feel pleasure from good things is hampered by opiate use."A meal, friendship, music, any of life's enjoyments, doesn't have the same impact on the user even after they stop using," Mumby said. "The ability to experience those things the way a non-user does is hampered."Dunbar, meanwhile, will discuss what police are seeing on the streets. He'll also give parents information about what to look for that might indicate their child is using heroin, "things you and I might not think of," Mumby said."Like looking behind light sockets, where drugs could be hidden, or spoons missing from the utensil drawer," she said.