diff --git a/Misc/NEWS.d/next/Library/2021-10-22-23-06-33.bpo-45574.svqA84.rst b/Misc/NEWS.d/next/Library/2021-10-22-23-06-33.bpo-45574.svqA84.rst
new file mode 100644
index 00000000000000..b404d24473960c
--- /dev/null
+++ b/Misc/NEWS.d/next/Library/2021-10-22-23-06-33.bpo-45574.svqA84.rst
@@ -0,0 +1 @@
+Fix warning about ``print_escape`` being unused.
diff --git a/Parser/tokenizer.c b/Parser/tokenizer.c
index 53c10282ce86a2..cd348487e0fd5f 100644
--- a/Parser/tokenizer.c
+++ b/Parser/tokenizer.c
@@ -994,6 +994,7 @@ tok_underflow_file(struct tok_state *tok) {
     return tok->done == E_OK;
 }
 
+#if defined(Py_DEBUG)
 static void
 print_escape(FILE *f, const char *s, Py_ssize_t size)
 {
@@ -1020,6 +1021,7 @@ print_escape(FILE *f, const char *s, Py_ssize_t size)
     }
     putc('"', f);
 }
+#endif
 
 /* Get next char, updating state; error code goes into tok->done */