Pubdate: Fri, 02 Jun 2006
Source: Oregonian, The (Portland, OR)
Copyright: 2006 The Oregonian
Contact:  http://www.oregonlive.com/oregonian/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/324
Author: Steve Suo
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/find?159 (Drug Courts)
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/meth.htm (Methamphetamine)
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/walters.htm (Walters, John)

U.S. SHIFTS METH FIGHT TO BLOCKING INGREDIENTS

Drugs - Specific Strategies And A First-Ever Measure To Foil The 
Black Market Signal A Higher Priority For The Battle

The Bush administration on Thursday released its plan to reduce 
methamphetamine use 15 percent by 2008, largely through efforts to 
close off the global black market in the drug's essential ingredients.

"This represents the commitment of the administration to work toward 
a meaningful and sustained reduction in meth use, as well as the 
number of meth labs that have been poisoning too many communities," 
said John Walters, director of the White House Office of National 
Drug Control Policy.

Walters' announcement -- at a news conference with officials from the 
Drug Enforcement Administration, the State Department and the Mexican 
Embassy -- constitutes the first time federal officials have set a 
specific benchmark for success in curbing meth use.

It comes three months after President Bush signed the Combat 
Methamphetamine Epidemic Act, which controlled U.S. sales of cold 
medicine and carved out unprecedented new responsibilities for the 
federal government in battling meth internationally.

Although many of the initiatives described in the strategy are under 
way, its content and tone dramatically underscore the heightened 
priority being given to the control of ephedrine and pseudoephedrine, 
cold medicine ingredients.

For example, the strategy recommends working with the World Health 
Organization to promote the development and use of decongestants that 
cannot be converted to meth. It has only been within the past year 
that U.S. drug companies have begun introducing phenylephrine as a 
replacement to pseudoephedrine.

"The speedy replacement on a global scale" of cold medicines with 
meth-proof ingredients "would significantly impair the international 
market for methamphetamine," the strategy says.

It identifies as part of the plan to reduce meth use the expansion of 
drug courts, targeted televised anti-meth ads and prosecution of 
high-level traffickers. But the document says tighter controls over 
global chemical sales are "the most urgent priority of the federal 
government toward reducing the supply of methamphetamine."

U.S. Rep. Brian Baird, D-Wash., a frequent critic of the 
administration's response to meth, called the strategy "a step in the 
right direction."

"I am pleased to see the administration has taken cues from Congress 
and pledged to devote more time, energy and resources to combating 
the international influx of meth," Baird said in a statement.

But he said the document is at odds with the administration's 
proposals to cut federal funding for local law enforcement. He called 
on White House officials to "match their rhetoric to their spending 
priorities."

Shifting approach

States' restrictions on sales of pseudoephedrine products have 
dramatically reduced the number of home meth labs in the past year. 
Walters pointed to Oregon as an example, where monthly drug lab 
seizures have dropped from 41 to nine since the state controlled 
sales of cold medicines.

But an estimated 80 percent of meth sold in the United States now 
comes from Mexican-based "superlabs."

Dave Murray, a top Walters aide, said now that the nation has had 
success in combating local meth production, the focus has turned to 
attacking the ability of Mexican cartels to make meth.

"This is the next stage, the next arena of this fight," Murray said.

Administration officials said they have been working intensely during 
the past year to garner greater international cooperation.

Mexican officials have agreed to reduce their imports of 
pseudoephedrine to about 70 tons, down from 224 tons in 2004. U.S. 
drug officials have begun an exchange program with their counterparts 
in Mexico's health ministry to improve their ability to spot 
diversion of ephedrine and pseudoephedrine from the legitimate marketplace.

Eduardo Ibarrola, deputy chief of mission at the Mexican Embassy in 
Washington, D.C., said the administration of President Vicente Fox 
recognizes that meth poses "a great risk to the health and well-being 
our societies."

"These drugs are highly addictive, incredible harmful, becoming less 
expensive and very easy to obtain," Ibarrola said.

In addition, U.S. officials in March successfully brokered a 
resolution through the U.N. Commission on Narcotic Drugs calling on 
all nations to estimate their legitimate demand for ephedrine and 
pseudoephedrine. The information would allow international 
authorities to know when a country is trying to import more 
pseudoephedrine than it needs.

The administration also is working on identifying top exporters of 
ephedrine and pseudoephedrine worldwide -- an effort required by the 
new meth law -- and plans to issue a report on those countries' 
chemical-control efforts by March 2007.

Walters said he has met recently with ambassadors from the 
ephedrine-manufacturing nations of China and India to urge expanded 
information sharing on sales of the cold medicine ingredients.

With these diplomatic efforts, Walters said, "we intend to cut off 
the flow of precursors to make methamphetamine."

Meeting the goals

The strategy predicts that the domestic and international efforts 
against meth chemicals and meth labs will pay off.

It predicts the number of meth labs seized in the United States will 
drop 25 percent by 2008, from a preliminary estimate of about 12,000 
to 13,000 in 2005.

And, it calls for a 15 percent reduction in the number of people who 
report using meth in the past month, from 583,000 in 2004 to 496,000 
in 2008, based on the National Household Survey on Drug Use and 
Health. The same survey shows 1.4 million Americans had used meth in 
the past year.

Administration officials acknowledged that the survey has a wide 
margin of error, but called a 15 percent reduction significant and attainable.

The document calls for closely monitoring a variety of other 
statistics related to meth use, such as emergency room admissions and 
the number of people age 12 to 25 trying the drug for the first time.
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MAP posted-by: Beth Wehrman