Delaware police say a fan blew fentanyl onto five Wilmington firefighters and two officers who were responding to an overdose, causing them to inhale the drug.
The first responders inhaled the drug when a family member of the woman being treated turned on a fan to cool the home. The first responders were hospitalized Thursday, and the woman they were called to assist died. The first responders have since been released.
Fentanyl has effects similar to heroin and can be 100 times more potent. State data says about 61 percent of the state's overdose deaths in 2016 involved fentanyl.
The frequency with which police run into fentanyl has prompted some departments to equip officers with masks, gloves, goggles and the overdose-fighting drug naloxone.