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America and Asia are
in the grip of an epidemic.
Coming in!
Methamphetamine,
one of the world's most
powerful stimulants, can
be made at home like
modern day Moonshine from
chemicals found in any
pharmacy or
hardware store.
Mike Hall: The way the
*** is right now,
it's like nothing I've
ever seen in my career.
It's toxic
and it destroys lives.
Mark Buckner: Burnt
everything I had
everything I own.
Addiction
quickly takes hold.
Organized crime steps in.
And law enforcement is
left to face the rising
crime wave.
Now would be a good
time to identify yourself
Producers,
traffickers, dealers,
users, doctors, police,
they're all part of the
$300 billion a year global
industry that is,
Drugs Incorporated.
Methamphetamine addiction
plagues America and much
of the world.
It can be injected,
smoked or snorted,
and one hit gets a user high
for as long as eight hours.
More addictive than
*** or alcohol,
*** traps users into
a devastating cycle.
All over the U.
S.
,
thousands of petty dealers
sell methamphetamine under
the street names 'crank',
'crystal',
'glass', or 'ice'.
A man going by the alias
Juan Lopez began his drug
career selling crack
*** for a Hispanic
street gang known as
the Mexican Mafia.
The drugs have
changed a lot you know in
the last, ten years.
*** has taken over.
LA.
The mid '90s.
A new product appears on
the streets: Crystalline
methamphetamine.
It's cheaper than crack
*** and more potent.
It becomes an instant
hit with drug users.
All the crack
users went to smoke ***.
All the people that were
snorting coke went to
snort ***.
While
serving time in jail,
a fellow inmate offers
Lopez the chance to move
up from street
dealer to trafficker.
I met a guy
who was from Mexico.
And we got to talking
about dope and he told me
he would be able to hook
me up once we were both
out.
Lopez now
has a solid connection.
Once free, he waits to
hear from his contact.
He got out And
through him we were able
to go into different
places in Mexico and find
dope.
Find all the deals.
Large Mexican
drug trafficking
organizations produce
methamphetamine on an
industrial scale.
Lopez starts to deal with
representatives from a
cartel in Sinaloa,
in northwest Mexico.
We would place an
order and send the money
to Mexico and then they
would cook it for us
there.
We paid about $45,000
for 13 pounds.
Lopez's contact
produces methamphetamine
by the ton, in a
'super-lab' hidden in the
Mexican countryside.
In the lab, cartel
drug workers convert
methamphetamine's
chemical ingredients,
ephedrine and
pseudo-ephedrine,
into their own
brand of the drug.
It's marketed to the
masses as 'Mexican Ice' or
'Crystal'.
Lopez's 13 pound order has
a street value of over
half a million dollars.
Then they would
work it from deep into
Mexico to the
California-Mexico border,
and then we would
cross it ourselves.
San Ysidro is
Lopez's crossing of choice.
This point of entry
between Tijuana, Mexico
and San Diego, California
is the busiest
land border crossing
in the world,
and America's front line
in the war on drug s.
We had a
car rigged with a hidden
compartment, put the dope
in the hidden compartment
and drive across
the border.
After waiting in
traffic for nearly five
nerve-wracking hours,
Lopez finally crosses the
border and makes his
way to a stash house in
California.
Here, Lopez cuts the drug
with empty fillers in
order to stretch his
product further.
Once we got
home we'd cut it with,
Er, MSM, like
a horse feed.
If we did 8 ounces,
it would be a 50% cut.
As fast as it came in, is
as fast as it went out.
I wouldn't sit on dope
for more than a day.
Your dope is going faster.
Your dope starts
to sell quick,
So you got to pick up,
enough to last you a week.
So you're up
to 5-10 pounds,
and it just slowly
works up from there.
We got to a point to where
we were selling about
At the height
of his operation,
this former lowly
street dealer owns nine
properties and clears
over $50,000 a week.
Lopez takes great pains
to avoid law enforcement,
but then, in 2005, a
police surveillance
operation catches
him in the act.
To avoid life in prison,
he turns informant for the
US government.
Now, he lives
in grave danger.
The cartels are known to
kill those who betray them.
Out here in
the streets if you
have a green light,
you're pretty much dead.
And anybody that knows
that you have green light
has the go-ahead to go
ahead and to kill you.
If that's what they need to do.
The Mexican ***
trade relies on hundreds
of traffickers and
dealers like Lopez.
Every year the cartels
produce approximately
the US market alone,
with an estimated revenue
of 8 billion dollars.
Meeting this demand
requires industrial
quantities of the
chemical ingredients.
To obtain these so-called
'precursor' chemicals,
the Mexican cartels turn
to the world's main source
of ephedrine and
Asia.
In China and India,
a small number of
pharmaceutical factories
produce thousands of tons
of pseudo-ephedrine
for legitimate use.
Criminal middlemen legally
purchase vast quantities
of these chemicals, and
then sell them to illegal
*** producers.
In Asia, a kilo, or
about 2.
2 pounds,
of pseudo-ephedrine costs
$68.
But international
criminal organizations,
like the Mexican cartels,
pay up to $10,000
for the same kilo.
The chemicals are sent to
super-labs all over the
world, where
they're cooked into
methamphetamine and
distributed regionally.
The trade supplies up
to 51 million users
worldwide.
In the U.
S.
, imported
Mexican methamphetamine is
rapidly spreading
eastward.
With increased
Mexican immigration,
traffickers and dealers
now hide within
law-abiding Hispanic
communities across
America.
Many roads from the
Mexican border lead to
tons of *** coming into
the U.
S.
originates from
Mexican sources,
like the one used
by Juan Lopez.
But Mexican Ice isn't
the only kind of
methamphetamine available.
Unlike *** or ***,
methamphetamine can also
be made at home, using
a concoction of readily
available household
chemicals.
Barry County, Missouri: a
sparsely populated area of
fields and farmsteads that
stretch for almost 800 miles.
Narcotics Agent Larry Keen
is from the South West
Missouri Drug Taskforce.
Hey Adam, how many times
have we arrested this guy?
I've arrested
him 3 times, over.
He's on his way to
his
of the year.
I guess we're gonna
go to the door with you and
I'll go to the garage with
the other two agents
I guess i go to the
door with you guys then
The target is a local
man, suspected of manufacturing
the drug and dealing
it to others.
Unlike other drugs,
methamphetamine can be
cooked in home
labs like these.
Maybe you ought to
go the other way.
On this road too.
Larry supervises
a team of six officers who
surround the house.
They waste no
time busting in.
Coming in!
I've got you covered.
On the
ground, face down!
On the ground, face down!
Get down!
Face down.
Inside, the
officers find the suspect
and another man cooking
a fresh batch of
methamphetamine.
So in order to keep
them from destroying any
evidence, we've made
entry and secured him,
and there is a
lab here, so.
Methamphetamine
can be produced using
rudimentary equipment
and household chemicals.
Phew, still
stinks in here.
"Cooks" follow
a number of different
recipes.
But the officers have
never seen this kind of
home lab before.
First one.
It's our first one.
They're using
the new 'one pot' method.
A method so simple that
anyone can now make ***.
Interesting.
Very interesting.
A few
essential ingredients,
including ammonium
fertilizer and lithium
from household batteries,
are placed in a simple
soda bottle.
The chemicals react and
produce methamphetamine,
along with poisonous
and explosive fumes.
This'll be his
gas generator with his
muriatic, muriatic
acid and, Er, salt.
Oh, phew, it stinks
in there too.
In the trash,
Larry discovers the core
active ingredient: a
cold and flu medication
containing
pseudo-ephedrine that can
be bought over the counter
at any local pharmacy.
He just
bought these,
he bought these pills
today at 12:45,
so, and it's
what, 2.
45 now,
so you know if
you're getting,
if you're getting two and
a half grams every hour
and a half and you're
doing it for five to six
hours a day, you can end
up with a pretty good
chunk of dope.
This is probably about a
gram worth right here.
Give or take.
Like many
"home producers"
this cook is an addict
who makes *** for extra
money to fuel his
own drug habit.
Nearly 1500 ***
labs were discovered in
Missouri in 2009, making
it one of the worst-hit
states in the epidemic
of home *** cooking.
I don't know where
this 'one pot' method
started but it's here now.
So if he's doing it,
he said he wasn't even
cooking before this, he
started cooking when he
learned how to do the 'one
pot' method and so if he's
doing it, there's more
people doing it.
For Larry
Keen and his taskforce,
busting home *** cooks
and breaking the supply
chain of traffickers like
Juan Lopez is all part of
fighting the larger
war on drugs.
Methamphetamine
addiction is a global
epidemic, and nowhere
more than America.
The largest
methamphetamine market in
the western hemisphere.
Dealers sell ***
on the streets,
and a new wave of
self-manufacturing means
it's even easier to
produce at home.
In the state of Missouri,
an estimated 53,000 people
use methamphetamine.
Steve Box was an
addict for ten years.
He first tried ***
at the age of 25 while
experimenting
with ***.
The very first time
was when you would be
using ***, and
somebody would have some
*** and it would look
similar to ***, and,
and you would like snort
some and you'd know
immediately it wasn't
*** that it was crank.
'cause it would it burns
like somebody sticking a
hot poker up your nose.
Steve is one of
the only 6% of addicts who
manage to kick the habit.
Now he's dedicated to helping
others fight *** addiction.
He's written two books
about his struggle and
runs a Christian campaign
called ***=Sorcery.
When I
got off the ***,
I wrote the book
***=Sorcery,
and we send the book to
prisoners that are locked
up in prisons and we've
probably been close to
the American county jail
prison system.
He receives
hundreds of letters from
*** addicts
seeking his support t .
Just a few
today from Texas,
Texas and Oklahoma.
I've got letters from,
believe it or not,
serial killers in New
York to doctors, lawyers,
preachers.
Just about every
walk of life.
It's not always the guy
that's over in the trailer
park, you know, it's,
Er, just, you name it.
I think I've received a
letter from about every
profession there is.
Steve once owned
a successful business
manufacturing
gym equipment.
Snorting ***, or
'crank' as he calls it,
helped him keep up with
the flow of orders.
I noticed with the
crank that I could stay up
you know, 24 hours a day
and I could work for you
know, a week or 2 straight
without stopping.
Methamphetamine
makes the user feel
euphoric, alert
and powerful.
Steve soon begins smoking
his *** in a pipe to get
a stronger, faster high.
Eventually he starts
dealing the drug,
and his business
begins to suffer.
You know, I got
to where I was just,
I was selling *** and I
was no longer building my
weight equipment.
And you know, the shop was
still kind of like open,
but we were, we were just
doing something different.
***'s
extraordinary rush leads
to horrific after-effects,
including severe
depression and an
inability to eat or sleep.
You feel
like you want,
you wanna just
rip your face off.
And when you do finally
get some real sleep you
twitch, and you jerk.
To avoid the
withdrawal symptoms,
Steve smokes even
more of the drug.
Weeks without sleep
eventually leave him with
severe paranoid psychosis.
And so I might've
spent my day, one day,
would and I did this
tapping my own phone.
Numbers would appear to
me like a phone number,
And I would
cross-reference it in the
names and numbers phone
book and you would,
might end up at a
stranger's house just over
a set of numbers that
appeared out of thin air
and you got their address
out of a phone book and
you're sitting outside
their house with a
shotgun.
After
years of abuse,
Steve hits rock bottom.
Everybody lost
their trust in me.
My wife hated me.
Went from having a
lot to having nothing.
And just wanted out.
Wanted out of that world,
wanted out of the *** world.
And, Er, you know,
and found a way out.
Man 1: It's a good day
to be in the house of the
Lord, is it not?
Narrator or: Steve finds
salvation in his local
church community,
where incredibly,
almost half the
congregation has had
problems with
methamphetamine.
How many are
here in this room who were
at one time in
bondage to
methamphetamines?
Denise Ledbetter
had a long history of drug
abuse before she
discovered ***.
How I
first encountered
methamphetamine was.
I fell in love with the
wrong guy and he cooked
***, so I didn't have to
even go looking for it,
it was just right there.
Methamphetamine
gives a sense of
overwhelming pleasure.
You know It's such
a euphoric high, you know,
that you just want more
and more and more and
you'd do anything for it.
But Denise soon
finds herself living a
bizarre existence.
Typical day
would start at midnight,
you just want
another line,
you want another pipe, you want
another shot in your arm.
And then you
can, you know,
go and do something crazy,
like mow the yard again
for the third
time this week,
or clean the house again for
the third time this day.
You know, I used to clean
the bathroom with a
toothbrush, you know, I'd stay
in the bathroom and clean.
Large doses of
methamphetamine can also
cause hallucinations.
Like LSD, ***-induced
delusions seem entirely real.
I'm gonna do a big
blast and go outside to
the woods.
You know, and I saw owls
in the tree with baseball
shoes on and
baseball caps on.
And I was like: oh that's
cute, that's funny!
Evil men will
burn in the, pits of hell.
In deeply
religious areas,
many believers see ***
as the work of the devil
because of the demonic
visions so many users
experience.
Methamphetamines,
simply put, is sorcery and
witchcraft in its highest
degree.
Everybody has the
same set of symptoms.
They see devils
and demons.
You know, when you
first see 'em it's like,
ha-ha, you know, what
was that, you know.
What was that?
And you're out in the
woods and you hear things,
and you think, oh,
you know, so it's kind of fun,
you kind of play
around with the devil.
You know, and then it
gets serious, you know,
and then it gets, you don't
want 'em in your life.
As the
mind deteriorates,
so does the body.
The most dramatic physical
symptom of *** abuse is
known as '*** mouth'.
As users grind
their teeth,
the chemicals wear
away the enamel,
and the gums and
salivary glands dry out,
causing the teeth
to rot and decay.
Long-term users become
fearful and violent.
Over 80% of female users
report domestic violence,
including physical
and *** abuse.
I was gutter
trash, he told me,
and he would hit me and
push me down and throw
cigarettes on me, and pick
up a can of green beans,
can of whatever he could
find and throw at me.
Throw lighter fluid on me,
and throw a match to me.
And I mean, all those
things sound horrible and
you look, and you look
at me and you think,
why would you
put up with that?
But I did put up with it
because of the drugs.
Everybody that
I've ever talked to has
been on ***.
Every
year, over 125,000
Americans like Steve and
Denise seek treatment
for *** addiction.
For many, belief in a higher
power is the only way out.
Dangerous to make
and dangerous to take
Methamphetamine is the most
abused hard drug on the planet
Almost one million grams of ***
are snorted, smoked, or injected
every day.
And it's spreading
like wildfire
Today, many law enforcement
agencies say it's
the number one drug
threat in America.
It's
gonna be busy.
Ex-basketball player
Mike Hall is
director of the 10th Judicial
District Drug Task Force
in Athens, Tennessee.
We need to utilize
a couple of intelligence groups.
Standing
Hall is a towering figure
in the local fight against
***.
Mike Hall: The problem is
when they used to make
methamphetamine they had
to have a structure.
They would have
a house or,
a trailer or a hotel room.
Now they can be sitting
in a car just like we're
doing, drive down the road
and make methamphetamine.
Everything is
in this one pot,
and it's just the size
of a two liter bottle.
Athens is in an area
of and farmland and lush
forest that causes hay
fever and other allergies.
Mike Hall: We have one of
the highest allergy counts
in the South East.
Pollen.
And so we have a lot of
legitimate people who need
cold medicines,
pseudo pills,
and all that stuff can
also be used to make
methamphetamine.
Across town, the
drug taskforce pulls over
a vehicle.
In 2006, Federal anti-***
laws cracked down on
methamphetamine
production.
Sales of pseudo-ephedrine
are now strictly limited
to 9 grams a
month per person.
Mike Hall: He's already started
breaking packages down.
They suspect the
driver is one of a new
breed of criminal:
"smurfers"
a name given to them
by law enforcement.
Mike Hall: I believe it
came from the famous
cartoon in the States, was
The Smurfs and when people
go to Smurf it's all
these little Smurfs,
all these people
bringing back pseudo,
pseudo ephedrine and they
bring it back to Papa
Smurf, the main cook.
Smurfers are
usually addicts who visit
numerous pharmacies
buying their quota of
pseudo-ephedrine.
Then they hand them over
to methamphetamine cooks
in exchange for
dope or cash.
Mike Hall: This one
pharmacy we're looking to
today is in the top five
percent in the nation for
pseudo sales which is
amazing because we're not
New York City, we're not
Los Angeles, California.
We're in Athens,
Tennessee.
Er, and they roughly have
about 600 pseudo sales
a week.
Hall's taskforce
surrounds a local pharmacy
waiting for smurfers.
The pharmacy estimates
that 80% of all its
pseudo-ephedrine sales go
towards *** production.
And the cars
normally will park along
that concrete wall because
they think I guess the
video cameras can't
see their vehicle.
And they'll take turns
going inside buying their
pseudo.
Inside
the pharmacy,
a packet of
pseudo-ephedrine pills
costs $5, but outside it
changes hands illegally
for up to $50.
The taskforce doesn't
wait long before
smurfing activity begins.
Radio Voice: A girl
opened the door,
put her hand in
another guy's hand.
And now they're leaving.
In the
pharmacy parking lot,
a girl is seen receiving
pills from a smurfer.
As she
exits the pharmacy,
Mike's team swoops in.
Carrie Beth: I'm sorry.
She's the
girlfriend of a suspected
*** cook.
Hall orders the car
and its occupant to be
thoroughly searched.
Mike Hall: Well they
probably, they probably
need to go to rehab.
Okay.
The only way we
might be able to.
The suspect
denies possessing any
drugs, but the
police soon find
what they're looking for.
Hidden in pill bottles
is Methamphetamine,
packaged for re-sale.
Mike Hall: Is it ***?
The suspect
is just 18 years old.
As a father himself, the
girls age makes Mike Hall
even more determined
to stamp out ***.
Mike Hall: I'm a dad.
It's depressing.
I mean you get 18, 19
year olds out here making
methamphetamine, it's
terrible, it's terrible.
Carrie Beth: It's my
boyfriend's that's what it is.
Each gram of
*** is worth at least
$100, making it more
expensive than
*** or ***.
Mike Hall: Er, somebody
asked me if we would win
the war on
methamphetamine,
the war on drugs, I says:
"I might not win it,
but I'm not gonna
lose it on my back.
"
So here we go.
Come on, girl,
get in the back seat.
The
girl is arrested.
She'll soon enter a
treatment program.
As night falls,
the smurfing activity
escalates.
While patrolling the road
outside the pharmacy,
taskforce agents stop 20
smurfers in just one hour.
Inside the store, an
Undercover officer watches
the activity.
Undercover Cop:
Yeah, yeah, he,
he wants to buy
several boxes.
He said he bought
last night.
This man is part
of a gang of smurfers
waiting outside
in a vehicle.
He buys the pills.
But before the smurfers
can make their getaway,
the taskforce
springs into action.
Put your hands up.
Put your hands on
top of the car.
Smurfers are the
taskforce's best lead to
the *** cooks.
The threat of jail is
enough for these men to
reveal the address of
their drug source.
Mike Hall goes across
town to investigate.
Police Department.
State Police.
On
any drug bust,
Mike's main
concern is gunfire.
Mike Hall: If you're ready
it would be a good time
for you to
identify yourself.
I'd hate for you
to get shot
But on
a *** lab bust,
he must also contend with
the risk of chemical
hazards.
Mike Hall: spoons
with residue on.
Fumes produced
by manufacturing *** are
extremely toxic
and volatile.
Here, they discover only
a *** pipe and some drug
paraphernalia.
The taskforce
examines the premises,
but they're too late.
The cook has apparently
fled into the night.
I mean he's pretty
much broke through that
field right there,
round the yard,
hit the road and then cut
up this driveway right
here.
But evidence of
drug activity remains.
A horse-trailer
outside contains numerous
bloody syringes.
Oh, it's
full of blood!
Oh my God!
Like
most *** cooks,
this person is obviously
addicted to the drug.
Both needles
full of blood!
Any ***-cooking
materials in the trailer
may be heavily
contaminated with waste
chemicals produced during
the cooking process.
These chemicals are
dangerous to humans as
well as the surrounding
environment.
Chemical residues can
poison wild animals or
even pollute
the water table.
The agents suit up in
biohazard gear to protect
them from chemical
burns or infection.
Mike Hall's worst
fears are confirmed:
the horse-trailer is
filled with contaminated
*** trash.
Mike Hall: They're
so paranoid,
they're afraid to
throw anything out,
they're afraid to throw
anything to where they
feel like law enforcement
or somebody could find it
and catch them.
You see a lot of staph
infection, MRSA,
different types of
diseases you know that you
get when you're
just dirty.
Every one of these
plastic bottles and glass
jars represents a cook.
Every time you see one
of those plastic bottles
laying there that
means they cooked.
Evidently they like to use
needles here which is a
tremendous hazard for us
especially if they carry
AIDS/***, tuberculosis,
you know whatever.
From
the pharmacy,
through manufacture,
to injection,
the *** drug supply chain
is ravaging once peaceful
rural communities
across America.
And narcotics officers are
left literally picking up
the pieces.
The volatile
substances used to
manufacture *** can cause
an explosion powerful
enough to kill.
The Vanderbilt Hospital in
Nashville has one of the
nation's premiere
burns units.
Patients are flown
here from all over the
southeastern U.
S.
At any time, victims of
exploding methamphetamine
labs make up about a
quarter of the unit's
patients.
Mark Buckner has been in
intensive care for 53 days.
He suffered burns on over
*** lab exploded.
All it took
was one drop of sweat.
That sweat hit the, hit
the bottle and it blowed
up in my hands.
I was in my RV.
I've never seen nothing
burn that quick.
It blowed me
out of the door.
It burned everything I
had, everything I owned.
Mark's mother
holds down his tracheotomy
tube, a surgically
inserted airway in his
throat, to help him speak.
Buckner's mother: I come
every day, don't I?
Mark was once
under constant pressure to
supply other
addicts with ***.
I don't know, 50-75
people over here.
Car loads all day long,in
and out in and out.
I'd go 2 or 3 weeks
without sleeping.
When he was
flown in by heliCopter,
Mark was near death.
His injuries caused renal
and respiratory failure.
Dr.
Jeffrey Guy is
Mark's surgeon and the
Burns Unit Director.
Doctor Guy: When a flash
burns comes you know,
it's thousands of degrees.
And he's burned on
roughly 60% of his body.
This is absolutely a
life threatening injury.
And as you can
see in his case,
there's certainly a
life changing injury.
We literally have to kind
of shave this burnt skin
off, this is dead skin,
and then we do a series of
skin graphs where we
literally shave the
healthy skin from his
lower legs and we
basically transplant
to the burns.
But Mark's case
is just one of many.
Doctor Guy: We typically
have about 20 patients on
the service that have
some sort of *** related
event, where they're using
***, or cooking ***.
We get about
one, you know,
true *** lab explosion
about once every couple of
weeks, you know, maybe
every three or four weeks,
that ends somebody in the
intensive care unit or on
life support.
Mark
survived the tragedy,
but his life is
forever changed.
I'll never be
able to go out in the
sun like I used to or nothing.
It's changed everything
that's true.
Methamphetamine
cooks are often unwilling
to admit the cause
of their injuries.
Dr.
Guy looks for
the telltale signs
of *** use.
Doctor Guy: *** mouth is
certainly the most obvious.
Er, *** mouth is rotting
of the teeth and it's
pretty dramatic.
Er, you'll see people
who are just Er,
just totally emaciated.
The other thing is that
their bodies are just so
revved up, particularly if
they're still coming off
the *** and since their
body has seen so many
drugs that our medications
won't touch them.
Mark Buckner is
one of the 48% of ***
users who have no health
insurance and place a
great strain on the
hospital resources.
Doctor Guy: You know, when
all is said and done,
this will probably
cost a million dollars.
Um, and it's the right
thing to do to take care
of somebody like that.
But that's a million dollars
of uncompensated care.
This one hospital last year did
approximately 300 million
dollars in charity care.
This one hospital in
Central Tennessee.
Um, and so you have to
question how long can one
hospital provide 300
million dollars of
uncompensated care.
There has to be
an end to that.
Overall
healthcare costs for
Methamphetamine
users in the U.
S.
alone are estimated at
almost $864 million
dollars per year.
Hell,
it's not worth it.
I've done it, not because
I wanted to get high,
I done it for the
money, that's it.
And no amount of money
is worth this much pain.
Mark will need
more skin grafts and it's
unlikely he'll ever regain
full use of his hands.
Serious *** burn victims
need ongoing care for
years.
Sometimes decades.
Methamphetamine
is among the most
addictive substances
in the world.
Despite the horrors of
exploding *** labs,
many burn patients still
return to *** abuse.
Leading
Neuro-pharmacologist,
Dr.
Edythe London, has
spent her entire career
trying to figure out why
users are so addicted to
this drug.
Doctor London:
Neuro-pharmacologists are
interested in
understanding how drugs
work, and particularly how
medications might work and
interact with
brain function.
Maggie Lavalle
is a member of
Dr.
London's *** study.
Well a typical
week if I'm a full and
flourished *** addict,
I can go anywhere from,
I can smoke anywhere from
$200 worth of *** to $400
worth of ***.
Out of my mind.
Doctor London: Go and
close your eyes for me for
a second.
The volunteers
undergo a series of PE scans that produce images
that allow Dr London to
look inside the brain
and analyse the drug's
effects.
Methamphetamine causes the
brain to release chemical
messengers called
'neurotransmitters' that
make us think, feel and
behave in a particular
way.
Dr London: One of the
neurotransmitters that's
primarily affected by
methamphetamine is
dopamine.
Now we think of dopamine
as the pleasure
transmitter.
Many narcotics
stimulate a flow of
dopamine to the brain.
But methamphetamine floods
the brain up to 1200% more
than normal.
Dr.
London: There is a huge
release of dopamine and
that produces a feeling
of intense euphoria.
It also produces
feelings of competence.
But the areas
receiving these chemical
messages, the
dopamine receptors,
are damaged by toxins
in the methamphetamine.
Over long term use, the
receptors begin to fail.
*** addicts may have up
to 16% fewer dopamine
receptors than
a normal brain.
Doctor London: We've
recently shown that the
level of dopamine activity
in the brain is highly
correlated with
impulsivity.
The fewer dopamine
receptors the more
impulsive a person is.
So dopamine in the
methamphetamine abuser is
very much linked
to self-control.
This lack of
self-control not only adds
to the severity
of the addiction,
but also leads to other
violent or compulsive
behavior.
Maggie Lavalle found
herself unable to control
an impulse to steal.
Maggie Lavalle: I
embezzled $32,000.
I closed down a gas
station that I worked at.
Whatever I needed I had
it 'cause I took the money.
Dr.
London has
discovered that the brain
damage can often, but not
always, repair itself.
While the search for a
medical cure continues,
the only real option
available to addicts is
behavioral therapy,
like drug counseling.
Maggie Lavalle's
story isn't unusual.
In some Californian
cities,
nearly a third of all
persons arrested test
positive for
methamphetamine.
At the Santa Barbara
County Jail,
Chuck McClain is
determined to combat the
problem.
We started
The chief of the jail at
that time decided that,
you know, we need to get
something going here
because, you know, they
run a 75% recidivism rate.
McClain has 150
inmates in behavioural
therapy for drug abuse.
are *** users.
They receive a combination
of reading materials,
group therapy sessions and
one-on-one counselling.
Like many inmates
at Santa Barbara,
Dave Wagman is a
repeat offender.
The way I use is,
they're called runs or
binges I would inject
myself up to 5 or 6 times
a day if the stuff
was reasonably good.
Probably the last five
years I cannot stop doing
it until I get arrested.
For many,
Chuck's program works.
caught re-offending far
lower than the
jail's 75% average.
Still it means over a
third of his participants
will return to jail.
Chuck will see some of
these faces again and
again.
You have children?
Seven.
You have
seven kids?
Yes.
How old are you?
I'm 34.
Keeping a
prisoner in Santa Barbara
Jail costs $26,000 a year.
It's a heavy burden
for the taxpayers.
Nationally, the cost of
methamphetamine-related
crime is estimated at
around $4 billion.
When they're
out there using,
they're not working,
they're not contributing
to society.
They're taking
away from society.
It takes a lot of
money to house 'em,
it takes a lot of money
for the police force to
arrest them and so
on and so forth.
And that's a huge cost.
And that's what
this is all about,
is reducing the cost to
the community at large of
addiction.
Santa Barbara is
the only county facility
in California to offer a
full-fledged treatment
program.
Until scientists like
Edythe London find a cure
for methamphetamine
addiction,
America's jails and
treatment programs will
continue to house
the drug's victims.
Methamphetamine
directly impacts the
brain's pleasure center,
and there's one pleasure
that's heightened more
intensely than any other:
sex.
The health impact on some
communities is extreme.
San Francisco is
a mecca for gay,
lesbian and bisexual
people from around the
world.
In a community that has
suffered the terrible
effects of *** and AIDS,
methamphetamine has taken
a strong hold, with dire
consequences for those
fighting the *** virus.
Since the mid '90s,
'Crystal' *** has become
the drug of choice in
the gay club scene.
Aaron Schirmer took many
drugs, including ***,
before he discovered ***.
He was part of San
Francisco's gay crystal
*** scene for 8 years.
Crystal ***
is very accessible.
You can walk down the
street and find crystal
***, you know, in most
of the gay communities.
On the weekends it's
really easy to find in
clubs.
You know, I used to go
into bars and stand in the
rest room and be
offered a line.
Crystal *** gives
users a rush of energy.
The cascade of
dopamine entering the
brain and central nervous
system also intensifies
feelings of
*** arousal.
Like an
amazing euphoric rush.
Like you know, like I'm
experiencing primal life,
you know, urges that I've
always wanted to feel.
Aaron, a
photographer and club DJ,
has been *** positive
since he was 15.
For him, unsafe sex is
usually fraught with the
danger of
infecting someone.
But when he's injecting,
or "slamming"
methamphetamine, sex
suddenly becomes
uninhibited and
guilt-free.
It's like this
kind of sex that you would
have pre *** you know,
it's like where you could
just take all of
your clothes off,
be totally naked and
be raw with someone.
Losing all of your
inhibitions like that
feels really amazing,
Many *** positive
men in the city end up
having unprotected
sex with one other.
You know,
there's a population of
people who shoot
crystal ***,
or who use crystal
*** who are all ***.
And so that sex pool, that
pool of people you know,
can all have sex with each
other and not worry about
transmission
to one another,
which is in some ways
has been like kind of a
beautiful part of it, of,
of the crystal *** scene.
Crystal ***
soon becomes more than
just a club drug.
Homosexual *** users turn
to Internet dating sites
to hook up, and the search
term 'Party and Play' or
'PnP' becomes code
for drug-fuelled sex.
If you
put PnP people,
instantly know that you're
interested in doing
crystal ***
and having sex.
You know, it's kind of
like the fast food version
of, of sex and
drugs is, you know,
and you get online and
you can have someone,
at your door within
minutes with drugs and
ready to have
sex with you.
For those
high on drugs,
practicing safe sex is
often forgotten in the
haze.
You can get high
on crystal *** and party
all night long.
And Partying all night
long can mean having sex
with lots of guys
all night long,
even days on end, because
the drug keeps you high
for that long, and
unfortunately what often
happens is that using any
kind of protection goes
out the window.
When ***
negative men join in,
the crystal *** craze
becomes even more deadly.
You have the
people who are newly
coming into the crystal
*** scene who lose all
their inhibitions and
are *** negative who are
really vulnerable, and
especially when you have
like, you know, *** areas
and non *** areas all
shooting up and all losing
their inhibitions at once.
Of the 28,000
cases of AIDS diagnosed in
San Francisco
through 2008,
three quarters were among
men who have sex with
other men.
Within this community,
crystal *** is now a
major driver for
new *** infection.
Gay men who use
methamphetamine are three
to four times more likely
to have *** than the gay
men who don't.
It's really a significant
part of why *** infections
continue to occur.
Despite the risk,
the pleasures that come
with crystal make it
extremely hard to give up.
It was the most
psychologically addictive
drug I've ever
taken in my life,
and to this day getting
off crystal ***,
I think is a lot harder
than getting off ***.
The overall cost
of methamphetamine to the
United States is estimated
at $23 billion a year,
but the human cost of the
ruined relationships,
careers, and
health of addicts,
is impossible to quantify.
Even so, $35 billion worth
of profits from producing
and distributing ***
continue to pour into
Drugs, Inc.