WASHINGTON (AP) - Despite its opposition to making marijuana use legal, the Obama administration is urging the Supreme Court to reject a lawsuit from Nebraska and Oklahoma that seeks to declare Colorado's pot legalization unconstitutional. The Justice Department's top courtroom lawyer said in a brief filed Wednesday that the interstate dispute over a measure approved by Colorado voters in 2012 does not belong at the high court. Nebraska and Oklahoma filed their lawsuit directly with the Supreme Court in December 2014, arguing that Colorado's law allowing recreational-marijuana use by adults runs afoul of federal anti-drug laws. States can sue each other in the Supreme Court, a rare instance in which the justices are not hearing appeals of lowercourt rulings. [continues 114 words]
WASHINGTON - Methamphetamine use continued to decline in nearly every part of the country last year as the government sharpened its crackdown on precursor chemicals used to make the illegal drug. Overall, the number of workplace employees who tested positive for meth dropped 22 percent last year, according to a study released Wednesday by New Jersey-based Quest Diagnostics Inc., the nation's largest drug-testing company. Meth use in the Northeast, however, remained steady. At the same time, the Drug Enforcement Administration issued a report showing the number of illegal meth lab seizures plunged 31 percent last year, from 7,347 to 5,080. [continues 367 words]
WASHINGTON -- Meth abuse continues to fuel an increase in crimes like robbery and assault, straining the workload of local police forces despite a drop in the number of meth lab seizures, according to a survey Tuesday. Nearly half of county law enforcement officials consider methamphetamine their primary drug problem, more than cocaine, marijuana and heroin combined, the survey of the National Association of Counties found. "Abuse of this highly addictive brain-altering drug continues to destroy lives and strain essential county services across America," said Bill Hansell, the association's president and commissioner of Umatilla County, Ore. [continues 279 words]
WASHINGTON - Meth abuse continues to fuel an increase in crimes such as robbery and assault, straining the workload of local police forces despite a drop in the number of meth lab seizures, according to a survey Tuesday. Nearly half of county law enforcement officials consider methamphetamine their primary drug problem, more than cocaine, marijuana and heroin combined, the survey of the National Association of Counties found. "Abuse of this highly addictive, brain-altering drug continues to destroy lives and strain essential county services across America," said Bill Hansell, the association's president and commissioner of Umatilla County, Ore. [continues 258 words]
WASHINGTON - Good news in the fight against meth abuse came on two fronts Monday, with reports showing a major drop in methamphetamine lab seizures nationwide and a similar decline in the spread of the drug into the work place. Local law enforcement officials say there is still a strong appetite for the highly addictive drug and warned that meth makers in Mexico and other countries are moving to fill the supply void. The number of meth lab busts plummeted more than 30 percent last year as most states put in place laws to restrict the sale of over-the-counter cold medicines used to make meth, according to the Drug Enforcement Administration's El Paso Intelligence Center. [continues 461 words]
A Report On Treatment Figures Came As The Senate Acted To Restrict Medicine Used To Make The Drug. WASHINGTON - Drug-treatment centers have seen a substantial rise in the number of people seeking help for methamphetamine abuse, a report released yesterday said. As trafficking in the highly addictive drug has spread across the country, the number of meth users admitted to substance-abuse clinics more than quadrupled from 1993 to 2003, according to a review by the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration. [continues 407 words]
WASHINGTON - The days of buying some cold remedies off the shelf in drug stores soon may be gone, a casualty of the methamphetamine epidemic. Already more than a dozen states have laws that require retailers to sell Sudafed, Nyquil and other medicines only from behind the pharmacy counter. Now Congress is working on legislation intended to make it tougher for people to get the ingredients needed to manufacture the highly addictive drug. Retailers once resisted the idea, saying it would inconvenience consumers. Today, stores seem ready to go along with a federal law in hopes of avoiding a tangle of state regulations. [continues 577 words]
WASHINGTON -- The days of buying certain cold remedies off the drugstore shelf may soon be gone, a casualty of the methamphetamine epidemic. Picking up on laws already passed in more than a dozen states, Congress is thinking about requiring the nation's retailers to sell medicines like Sudafed behind the pharmacy counter to make it harder to get the ingredients needed to make highly addictive meth. A similar law in Kansas took effect this week, and a bill in Missouri is awaiting Gov. Matt Blunt's signature. [continues 707 words]
WASHINGTON - The days of buying certain cold remedies off the drug store shelf may soon be gone, a casualty of the methamphetamine epidemic. Picking up on laws already passed in more than a dozen states, Congress is thinking about requiring the nation's retailers to sell medicines like Sudafed and Nyquil behind the pharmacy counter to make it harder to get the ingredients needed to make highly addictive meth. A similar law in Kansas took effect this week and a bill in Missouri is awaiting the governor's signature. [continues 790 words]
WASHINGTON - Fewer teenagers are smoking cigarettes or using illegal drugs, but a survey released Tuesday shows a troubling increase in the use of inhalants by younger adolescents. The smoking rate among younger teens is half what it was in the mid-1990s, and drug use by that group is down by one-third, according to the University of Michigan study, done for the National Institute on Drug Abuse. Less dramatic strides have been made among older teens. Health experts and government officials called the annual survey of eighth, 10th and 12th-graders a sign of continued progress in the effort to reduce youth drug use and said further declines would come only with a sustained public education campaign about the consequences of drug abuse. [continues 485 words]
Stumping for votes in New Hampshire, presidential candidate John Edwards breezed through questions about war, health care and poverty before being stumped by a query about industrial hemp. "I could tell you, in general, my position about the medical use of marijuana, which is not what you are talking about," Edwards told a questioner Wednesday at an outdoor town meeting. "You are talking about industrialized hemp being used for WHAT?" Fiber from the plant, a relative of marijuana, is used to make paper, clothing, rope and other products. Its oil is found in lotions, cosmetics and some foods, and Paul Stillwell of Concord, N.H., said hemp also can be used to produce fuel. [continues 144 words]
