
Alt-newspaper New Times Los Angeles yanked it back to Riverside County in 1997. Contesting the designation that year was Florida’s Lakeland Ledger, which put it in Polk County, Fla. Hospital admissions for amphetamine-type stimulants are not well documented in Central and South America. There is information to suggest that there was a large number of admissions related to methamphetamine use in Mexico (more than 11,600) in 2010. Other data suggests that Venezuela reported nearly 30 admissions related to methamphetamine use in 2010.
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Methamphetamine is primarily produced in Europe in the Czech Republic. It may also be produced in some other countries like the Netherlands, Lithuania, and Bulgaria. The troubled Shan State has long been a global drug producer and was the world’s main source of opium and heroin – it is now second to Afghanistan. NPR transcripts are created on a rush deadline by an NPR contractor.
After more than half a century, one of Australia’s biggest maritime mysteries has been solved
RAND estimated there were just over two million cocaine users in 2016, down from nearly four million in 2006. And its survey tallied over two million heroin users, up about 30 percent since 2006, but still far below the number of methamphetamine users. The US Department of Health and Human Services counted about two million people who took methamphetamine in 2019, roughly the same number as in 2015.
What is Methamphetamine?
But what I quickly found was that those experiences couldn’t be understood outside of the criminal justice system. Many people only got treatment after an arrest, and often as a condition of probation. One officer told me that people came up to him on the street and asked to be taken to jail so they could stop using drugs. Community members also often channeled their concerns into calls for increased enforcement.

The story goes that a local meth cook dropped by their shop in about 1988, asking Jesús if he could bring in ephedrine from Mexico. But he brought ephedrine north and, with that, became attuned to the market that had been opened by Stenger’s innovation. Eduardo Chávez, another DEA agent, flew in from Mexico City the next afternoon. Each man had spent the early part of his career busting meth labs in rural California—Chávez in the area around Bakersfield, Perez in northeastern San Diego County.
Australia is high on ice, eclipsing 24 other countries
One of the most successful rehabilitation programs for methamphetamine addicts in SA is the Matrix Program, ran by PsychMed. “What we have at the moment is a lack of availability of all types of treatment, of all types of rehabilitation,” https://sober-home.org/ Shadow Minister Picton said. “They’ve [the Liberal government] done very little; they promised before the last election that they were going to have, in their words, a war on drugs,” Shadow Minister Picton said.
Primed by the new supply, meth demand has exploded, in turn drawing more dealers who have found their own supply connections. To compete, some Louisville meth dealers now offer free delivery; others offer syringes already loaded with liquid meth so users can immediately shoot up. Similar partnerships, arrangements, and retail innovations have transformed regional drug markets across the U.S.
Africa has traditionally been perceived as a transit country for drugs that are headed to the Far East. As a result, certain drugs of abuse have become popular in certain sections of Africa. Analysis of wastewater suggests many cities in these areas have seen increases in methamphetamine use (see below). However, Southeast Asia remains one of the world’s largest methamphetamine markets and its rising amount of seizures prove that the “War on Drugs” is not achieving its desired results.

Adelaide is the world’s meth capital, according to a recent study (CC BY 2.0). The effectiveness of these measures will depend on their implementation. In many cases, they’ve had a positive impact in reducing the use and availability of meth in some areas.
A Japanese researcher had first altered the ephedrine molecule to synthesize crystal methamphetamine in 1919. During World War II, it was marketed in Japan as hiropon, a word that combines the Japanese terms for “fatigue” and “fly away.” Hiropon was given to Japanese soldiers to increase alertness. https://sober-home.org/heroin-effects-addiction-withdrawal-symptoms-and/ California has the sixth-highest number of meth seizure incidents of any state. Meth overdoses killed 232 people in 2017 in the San Joaquin Valley. The Bakersfield Police Department reported that, aside from marijuana, meth made up about 75% of all drugs seized in the city in 2018.

Ultimately, the success of these measures will depend on their implementation in all meth capitals nationwide. The right action plan could help reduce the suffering that meth use causes and keep communities safe. Regulatory measures and primary care initiatives also impact community collaboration between local authorities, healthcare providers, and citizens. Meth use has reached crisis levels in many cities throughout the U.S. The consequences of addiction, violence, crime, and poverty have a devastating impact on communities.
However, regional NSW are using the drug more than any other rural area. Australia dominates the global consumption of methylamphetamine, topping the list of 24 countries for heaviest users. In 2017, Adelaide’s wastewater revealed between 507 and 659 milligrams of methamphetamine — or „ice“ — per 1,000 people each day, compared with between 270 and 331mg in Canberra and Toowoomba.
They include the Guerreros Unidos and Rojos (both formerly under the banner of the Beltrán Leyva Organization), the Cartel del Norte (formerly the Zetas), and the Juárez Cartel and La Línea (the latter having split off from the Juárez Cartel). However, counterdrug officials and experts say these groups may be as much brand names as criminal organizations allowing for varying degrees of independence at the base level, especially with the barriers of entry becoming lower. These organizations have also diversified their precursor chemical use, shifting among suppliers and chemicals to keep authorities off balance.
Meth-related overdoses, crimes, and deaths all take their toll on an area’s resources and well-being. „I think that is quite a sad situation and underlies the harms that are posed by consumption of these illicit drugs.“ Despite the growing cost of living pressures, Mr Neilson said if given the choice, people would still choose to take illicit drugs over paying for household needs.
Acetone is a colourless liquid used to produce a variety of products, including solvents for paints and plastics, but it can also be also used illegally to produce drugs. It is not clear whether the suspects were manufacturing drugs to distribute within the country or elsewhere, she said. Even many years later, when I spoke with him, Barrera didn’t know how the drug he was using had changed and spread, or why. But as a resident of Southern California, he was among the first to be affected by it. Over the next half-dozen years or so, the flood of P2P meth would spread east, immersing much of the rest of the country, too.
The challenge is ensuring such measures are implemented in all meth capitals nationwide. Aside from being the first line of defense against the production and sale of meth, police forces and state authorities also implement community-based prevention programs. These seek to create awareness and discourage drug use among youth in particular. Neighborhoods suffer from the devastating effects of systemic violence, meth trafficking, and dealing. The production of meth also leads to contaminating surrounding properties with toxic waste and chemicals.
They produced 10 to 15 pounds per cook in 24 hours in what came to be known as “super labs.” Soon the biker gangs were buying their meth from the Mexicans. They set up many in California’s rural Central Valley—Eduardo Chávez’s territory—making use of an existing network of traffickers among the truckers and migrant farmworkers that stretched up from San Diego. At one bust, agents found a man in protective garments with an air tank on his back. He turned out to be a veterinarian from Michoacán who said he came up for four-month stints to teach the workers to cook. Among the drawbacks of the P2P method is that it produces two kinds of methamphetamine.
- During World War II, it was marketed in Japan as hiropon, a word that combines the Japanese terms for “fatigue” and “fly away.” Hiropon was given to Japanese soldiers to increase alertness.
- Taking wastewater samples from 56 regional and metropolitan sites across Australia, covering a population of 13 million people, the report compares drug consumption between different states and territories over a specific period.
- Far from being a deterrent, the raids showed that no one would pay a personal price, and more people entered the trade as a result.
- The U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration classified it as a Schedule II stimulant, making it only available through a non-refillable prescription.
- Like many other labs that had been popping up in Mexico, it reflected the union of substantial capital and little concern for law enforcement.
ACIC principal advisor for drugs, Shane Neilson, said the Australian illicit drug market was supplied by both international imports and domestic manufacturing. Sze Hoi Shing faces the death penalty for allegedly having more than 4kg of methamphetamine for the purpose of trafficking outside an office in Changi. In 2012, a Los Angeles Superior Court judge, Craig Mitchell, founded L.A.’s Skid Row Running Club. Every Monday, Thursday, and Saturday, 20 to 50 people—recovering addicts, cops, public defenders, social workers—meet around dawn in front of a local shelter to run for an hour through the greatest concentration of homeless people in the United States. The club’s broader mission is to support the area’s homeless community through mentorship and a focus on wellness. Listening to traffickers on wiretaps, one DEA agent told me, made it clear just how loose the confederations of meth suppliers were by then.
Much of the methamphetamine that comes into the United States or that is illegally smuggled to other parts of the world, comes from Central America and South America. There may be quite a bit of undocumented methamphetamine use in these countries. Men (8.2 percent) are more likely to use methamphetamine than women (5.9 percent). Nonetheless, globally, methamphetamine use and abuse appear to be on the rise. The heaviest abuse of meth (street methamphetamine) appears to occur in parts of Asia, Europe, Australia, and the United States.