Pubdate: Tue, 06 Nov 2001 Source: Des Moines Register (IA) Copyright: 2001 The Des Moines Register. Contact: http://www.dmregister.com/ Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/123 Author: Lee Rood Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/meth.htm (Methamphetamine) USE OF METH SURGES IN IOWA Officials Say More Women Are Hooked Iowans' hunger for methamphetamine appears to be growing again despite unprecedented attempts to fight the highly addictive stimulant, state officials say. "It's extremely disturbing this time," said Bruce Upchurch, the state's drug policy coordinator, "especially considering the potential effect of state budget cuts." Prison authorities and drug counselors say a greater proportion of meth users in trouble now are women compared with three years ago, when the state's epidemic with the stimulant was thought to have peaked. Authorities say they face additional challenges from ecstasy and LSD trafficking, which have grown considerably in recent years. But problems created by those illicit club drugs still pale next to those wrought by meth, Iowa's hard drug of choice. Consider: * In the spring, drug agents found 5,000 hits of LSD, enough to take the whole of Iowa State University's freshmen class on a hallucinogenic trip, in an Ames neighborhood thick with students. The seizure was one of the biggest LSD busts in state history, easily dwarfing all the ecstasy netted so far this year, state narcotics agents said. Yet, dose for dose, 76 times more imported methamphetamine than LSD has been seized this year by the state; 310 times more meth has been found than ecstasy. That excludes the methamphetamine confiscated by federal agents and that found in hundreds of small clandestine labs around the state, the numbers of which are growing again. Ken Carter, state narcotics division director, predicts Iowa's 24 drug task forces will take in more meth by year's end than in 1998, a record year for seizures. * Just last month, the proportion of Iowa inmates entering prison who reported meth as their primary drug of choice rose to its highest level ever - 30.2 percent, Upchurch said. For the first time, women entering the prison system admitted using methamphetamine more than alcohol, a surprising 43.14 percent of all incoming female inmates. * More people than ever have begun to flood Iowa's treatment centers for methamphetamine use. During the state's last fiscal year, 4,745 people - roughly one in every 600 Iowans - were screened or admitted for the drug, said Janet Zwick of the Iowa Department of Public Health. That's roughly 700 people over the previous fiscal year, many of whom received far less treatment than is recommended to treat the hard-to- kick drug. John Garringer, executive director of the Area Substance Abuse Council in Cedar Rapids, said almost 51 percent of his agency's meth clients are women, up from 40 percent in 1999. The treatment programs, which include several rural areas in eastern Iowa, also are seeing record numbers of meth clients. "We're just seeing a resurgence, and I'm not sure why," he said. "We really can't keep up with the demand for services." Targeted by Mexican drug cartels as an area ripe for trafficking, Iowa was largely taken by surprise in the mid-1990s as meth began to claim thousands of addicts and overwhelm rural law enforcement, Carter said. Crime triggered by the drug's erratic nature spread across the state. Small-time cookers of the synthetic drug grew exponentially, discarding toxic heaps of spent ingredients and crude laboratories fashioned out of rubber hoses, glass and metal. By late in the "90s, however, the number of drug agents in the state had doubled, a full-time clandestine meth lab team was up and running, and laws targeting cookers, dealers and traffickers offered new weapons to fight the scourge. Iowa was among six Midwestern states to share $12 million annually in extra federal money because of acute meth problems. Last year, Upchurch and other drug officials reported for the first time they were cautiously optimistic that the state had seen the worst of the drug. Meth seizures appeared to be dropping, as did the number of clandestine laboratories discovered. Treatment providers such as Garringer noted a dip in 2000 in the number of meth clients over the previous couple of years. But the optimism was not to last. Drug seizures by state agents are on the rise this year, and the federal Drug Enforcement Agency continues to find large quantities of imported meth in Iowa, said Mark Hine, the DEA's resident agent in charge. Agents in the past year uncovered two shipments of more than 32 pounds, some of the biggest seizures since meth arrived in Iowa. What's more, the Dakotas, Illinois and Minnesota have begun to experience the kinds of meth problems Iowa, Kansas and Missouri have had for years. Drug agents say roughly 85 percent of Iowa's supply is still believed to travel an interstate pipeline from Mexico and southern California. Hine, Carter and others are encouraged by Congress' approval this year of $1 million for a 17-county coordinated drug task force, headquartered in the southern portion of the state. Drug officials also are reorganizing the state's 24 drug task forces to make the most out of available resources, modernize techniques and ease the sharing of drug intelligence, Upchurch said. Authorities continue to work with retailers to prevent large sales of chemicals used to make meth, such as starter fluid, pseudoephedrine tablets and ether, he said. Yet, around Iowa and the Midwest, the problem appears to grow with every new addict taken in. "I think much of the initial curiosity about meth is gone," said Marshall County Sheriff Ted Kamatchus. "The state has done an excellent job of promoting the down side of addiction. We're just dealing now with good, old-fashioned users who are hooked on it." Garringer and others predict Iowa will experience a growing crime problem, as likely budget cuts will reduce already strapped drug- treatment resources. Already, agencies such as his have waiting lists of three to four weeks to receive outpatient counseling and treatment. The Area Substance Abuse Council lost four staff positions following the last rounds of cuts, he said. "The problem with waiting lists in our field is that people can't wait," he said. "We need to be able to provide services or we're going to lose them to drug abuse." - --- MAP posted-by: Josh