Pubdate: Tue, 25 Jan 2005
Source: Enterprise-Journal, The (MS)
Copyright: 2005 The Enterprise-Journal
Contact:  http://www.enterprise-journal.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/917
Author: Shelia Hardwell Byrd
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/meth.htm (Methamphetamine)

METH BILLS MAY MAKE IT HARDER TO BUY COLD MEDICINE

If Mississippi follows Oklahoma's lead, getting relief from the common cold 
will become slightly more complicated.

Hidden in some popular cold medicines is pseudoephedrine, a chemical that's 
part of the recipe for cooking methamphetamine, a highly potent illegal 
drug that gives users instant and long-lasting euphoria.

Methamphetamine - also called speed, crank and ice - was popularized by 
bikers and truckers in the late 1980s. Since then, it has spread across the 
nation, leaving a trail of wrecked lives, orphaned children and 
environmental contamination.

Addicts and drug peddlers cook the chemicals in their homes or in hotels, 
exposing themselves, their children and their neighbors to potential 
explosions. Over the last few years, law enforcement officials have seized 
thousands of clandestine labs and the cleanup - at an average of $4,000 per 
lab - has been costly to taxpayers.

Gov. Haley Barbour is urging lawmakers to make it tougher to purchase 
over-the-counter cold remedies that contain pseudoephedrine. In his State 
of the State address, Barbour called meth a "horrible plague on our state."

The governor also wants tougher penalties for those who manufacture or 
traffic the drug in the presence of children.

Florida, Iowa, New Mexico and South Dakota are among the states that 
recently have enacted tougher penalties for methamphetamine. Some target 
sales, some target production and some target people trying to purchase 
cold medicines.

Iowa's law makes it illegal to buy more than two packages of 
pseudoephedrine at a time. A bill pending in the Mississippi House would 
make it illegal to purchase more than four packages at a time.

That's not going far enough, says Senate Judiciary B Committee Chairman 
Gray Tollison, D-Oxford. Tollison supports a Senate bill that would add a 
middleman to the purchase process. The bill would require a pharmacist or 
assistant to hand the cold medicine to consumers. A customer would have to 
present identification, but no prescription would be needed.

The legislation was based on a new Oklahoma law that has brought an 80 
percent drop in methamphetamine lab seizures.

Tollison acknowledged enacting the law would be inconvenient, but he said 
it's a burden worth bearing for the greater good.

Stamping out meth abuse appears to be one of the few issues on which 
lawmakers and the governor agree, and with such widespread support, a 
stronger law is likely to pass.

Tollison is scheduled this week to hold hearings on a slew of meth bills. 
There are at least 10 this session.

Some of the proposals would:

. Make it a felony to break into a tank with the intent to steal anhydrous 
ammonia, an ingredient in methamphetamine.

. Enhance the penalties for boobytraps set by meth addicts to evade law 
enforcers.

. Prohibit the state from paying for dental services for inmates who are 
meth addicts. The drug decays the user's teeth.

Sen. Cindy Hyde-Smith, D-Brookhaven, said personal experiences led her to 
file the bill that would make it a felony to break into an anhydrous 
ammonia tank. Hyde-Smith, who lives on a farm, said thieves routinely break 
into her tanks. She said the tanks are empty.

"Several people have been arrested in my front yard," she said.
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