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Collateral Damage Of Meth

All addictions, whether substance-based (drugs, alcohol) or behavior-based (compulsive gambling, etc.) cause some degree of "collateral" damage.    In other words, in addition to the damage to the abusers themselves, addiction inflicts damage on friends, families, employers and society as a whole.

But even from the perspective of "collateral" damage, methamphetamine is in a class by itself.  Meth begins having a negative impact while it's being manufactured and continues to negatively impact various factions of society until long after it's been consumed and in certain cases, forever. None of the other drugs, including alcohol come even close to methamphetamine's relentless ability to infect, endanger and destroy everything near it.

Some say the collateral damage of a meth user affects at least eighteen to twenty-five other people.  We have no reason to dispute that, but to be honest, we're not sure how you would measure that.  But what we do know is that if you look at meth in its entirety, the negative social impact is mind-boggling.  Here's what we mean.

If you combine all the negatives that meth can deliver, here are just some of the people that meth can negatively impact or hurt:

• the people making it
• anyone physically near the people making it, especially children
• anyone using it  (for a variety of reasons)
• anyone coming into extended contact with someone using it
• law enforcement officials who inadvertently and unexpectedly come upon a meth lab
• those who have formal meth lab clean-up responsibilities
• those who own places where it's manufactured
• those who move in to places where it's been manufactured in the past
• those who live near places of manufacture (past or present)
• those who come in contact with the toxic waste resulting from meth production
• those who provide outreach and detox services to meth addict/cooks
• a fetus in the womb of someone using meth or living in a meth lab
• the family and children of meth addicted parents
• employers
• those who may have sexual contact with someone injecting meth
• those who share needles with someone using meth
• those affected by the crime associated with meth, particularly one of the most damaging and prevalent - identity theft
• those who happen to be near a meth addict when they're in full tilt psychosis.

And believe it or not, the list goes on.  If you consider the fact that the highly toxic wastes from meth labs are routinely thrown into streams, lakes, rivers, farmlands, sewer systems and public parks, who isn't negatively impacted by meth?  It may be several years until we really know the total extent of meth's damage.  Other forms of addiction are also harmful, and many items on the list above could apply to them as well.  But not all of the items.  As we said, meth is in a class by itself.

Methamphetamine - A "Morphing" Market

The last perspective we should view methamphetamine from is its ability to "morph" or transform into something else.  In many regions, being busted on a meth charge carries bigger penalties "pound for pound" than being busted for cocaine.  Now you must know that high level drug dealers accept both the risk of death and the risk of long prison terms as almost a "condition of employment."  Having said that, they also will do everything to minimize those risks where possible.

So what we're seeing is that as interdiction and enforcement efforts intensify on imported meth in certain High Intensity Drug Trafficking Areas (HIDTA) some meth importers switch to cocaine, if only temporarily - long enough for things to "cool down."  They have no huge warehouses of inventory - meth is one of the few drugs that can literally be "manufactured to demand."

So the importer realizes a similar profit margin and with less risk and less penalty if caught.  In addition, the methods of packing cocaine and smuggling or "muling" it in to another country are similar to meth, so the technique for getting it to its destination is familiar to the importer.

One thing that would change for an importer who decides to do this would be the price of cocaine.  It's traditionally higher than meth, traditionally more stable and it's more competitive, so the price of coke would have to come down in order to lure the meth user.  But despite how many meth dealers turn into coke dealers, there's always going to be someone to pick up the slack in the meth market.  But what this shows is that the meth market is not this stable, static, dependable entity.  It's always changing, always adapting and as a result, virtually impossible to address when the emphasis is on the supply side.  The emphasis has to be at least equal from the demand side as well, and that means awareness, prevention AND high quality treatment.

So What Do We Have Here Now?

• is easy and inexpensive to make
• unlike all other drugs, can be "manufactured to demand"
• is highly profitable
• has an extremely short production cycle (a fraction of other drugs)
• uses production facilities that can be mobile or moved from place to place
• is easily transportable from place of manufacture to place of sale
• involves profits just for transporting it from market to market
• already has a native or existing market of one degree or another virtually everywhere
• is cheap enough that virtually anyone can afford it
• reaches into all demographics
• offers a terrific initial high
• is easily added to, or "piggy-backed" on to other stimulants (ie: Ecstasy)
• is extremely addictive
• is extremely complicated to treat (relative to other addictions)
• is extremely expensive to treat (relative to other addictions)
• negatively impacts virtually everyone near it from the point of while it's being manufactured to years, perhaps decades after it's consumed.
• poses a significant threat to the environment
• can disappear from the market and re-appear again with no measurable impact on the supplier or the user base.

So that's some of what we know.  But what about what we don't know, or at least, what we don't appear to know?  Ironically, prime among what we don't know at any given moment seems to be the price of meth.  Does that surprise you?  Well, have a look at the next page and you'll see what we mean.

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