Gay Crystal Meth Addiction in Florida Causes Alarm
It has been called the most insidious drug of the new millennium — a substance worse than crack cocaine.
With one hit, crystal methamphetamine produces a feeling of euphoria and a sense of acuity that lasts hours longer than cocaine, making it popular among bleary-eyed truckers and overwhelmed college students. In the last decade crystal meth, long known as the scourge of the West Coast, has been burning a trail across the nation — so much so that California recently lost its title as the nation’s speed capital when Missouri’s fields and farmhouses became ideal sites for 2,207 labs.
As law enforcement in the South targets crystal meth, manufacturers dubbed “cookers” have started to spill into Florida. Here, buying meth’s over-the-counter ingredients in bulk won’t alert authorities as it would in other states that now scrutinize such purchases.
Florida state law enforcement officials first busted a Florida meth lab in 1997, the same year they created a task force to deal with the growing problem in Central Florida. In the last few years, crystal meth has begun to surface in South Florida, where at $2,000 a gram, it remains almost three times more expensive than cocaine. Not for long, warn some Miami-Dade and Broward county, Florida health experts and law enforcement officials who set up South Florida’s first meth task force in May 2003.
Five months later, in October, authorities had their first major bust: 10 pounds of crystal meth in Coral Gables, Florida.
“The street value was between $1 and $5 million,” Coral Gables Police Sgt. Raul Pedro said of the bust. “My understanding is that as far as they know it’s the largest single seizure of the drug in this county’s history.”
By December, Gov. Jeb Bush approved six regional response teams to crack down on illegal labs, including one in Fort Lauderdale, Florida.
The societal costs of the drug are high. Each pound of meth generates 10 times its weight in toxic waste, substances U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration officials fear will seep into the state’s high water table. It can cost federal taxpayers up to $38,000 to clean a lab.
“And all the stuff to make it is legal,” said North Miami Beach Police Detective Mark Demarcus, who teaches officers about crystal meth. “Once the guys down here that deal crack find out how easy it is to make crystal meth, it’s probably going to blow crack right off the streets.”
While crystal meth Florida is generally made by transients who cook the drug in mobile homes, motel rooms or rented trucks in Central Florida , the drug has found a more affluent following in the southern part of the state, authorities say. Here, among the beautiful people, it’s nicknamed “Tina” by white-collar users in the gay party circuit who say it keeps their abs tight and gives them energy to dance all night and lose any inhibitions.
Studies in California show meth users both gay and straight are likely to have more partners and riskier sex than other types of drug users. In South Florida, meth has contributed to the recent spike in AIDS and syphilis rates, health officials say.
Marc Cohen, president of the United Foundation for AIDS in Miami, Florida noticed the connection. In 2002, he helped organize the area’s first Gay Crystal Meth Anonymous meeting. A year later, an estimated 200 addicts attend daily meetings in Miami Beach and Fort Lauderdale, and plans are under way to start meetings in Palm Beach County, Florida. Almost all attendees are gay men, and more than half are HIV positive or have syphilis, he said. Even though gay crystal meth addiction has grown in the LGBT community, the drug is also starting to surface in other parts of the community. To deal with the gay crystal meth epidemic, LGBT friendly drug rehabs have emerged.
“One woman was in medical school and using it to stay up and study,” said Cohen, who is scrambling to organize more meetings. “The fact that I just got a call about a 15-year old girl is significant. That kid is doing it with other kids, and where there’s smoke … ”
`Poor man’s cocaine’
Meth is called a “poor man’s cocaine” because it produces a similar but cheaper high. Drug makers can whip up a batch of meth in a day with products available in a grocery store, using one of dozens of recipes on the Internet.
Cookers extract ephedrine from cold medicine and by changing one oxygen molecule, create speed. But all manner of toxic chemicals from paint thinner to liquid fertilizer are used to make and clean the drug.
For an effective drug rehab able to treat crystal meth addiction call the national addiction treatment helpline at 1-800-511-9225.
The drug, which can be smoked, swallowed and injected, became available in the U.S. around the same time. By the 1970s, when legislation restricted the production of the drug, motorcycle gangs began illegally trafficking what was then nicknamed “crank” because they carried it in their crankcase. Meth eventually resurfaced and by the 1990s had become a nationwide epidemic.
Florida law enforcement found the state’s first lab in 1997 — the same year fashion mogul Gianni Versace was murdered in Miami Beach by a meth user, according to a book by journalist Maureen Orth. By 2001, Florida law enforcement dismantled 28 labs, a figure that mushroomed to 229 labs in fiscal 2003. In the first quarter of fiscal 2004, they busted 88 labs, many in Polk County and Florida’s Panhandle.
These days a dozen officers with the Central Florida Methamphetamine Task Force in Tampa work full time arresting meth addicts nicknamed “chicken heads,” and dismantling labs. With practice, they have come to recognize the signs: emptied foil sleeves of Actifed or Sudafed, containers of liquid fertilizer and beakers that reek of chemicals so strong, they have been compared to ether or cat urine. Sometimes the presence of drug labs is even more obvious — one in six labs blows up, say experts.
Cocaine traffickers may be helping to keep the drug at bay in South Florida by threatening meth dealers, say federal officials. Omar Aleman, a former DEA official, said Colombian cocaine cartels keep their prices much lower than meth, which is being made in bulk in Mexico.
Still, the lack of labs hasn’t stopped the drug’s growing popularity in South Florida.
The Broward County Commission on Substance Abuse became so concerned about this emerging drug epidemic, and its correlation with the spread of sexually transmitted diseases, that it organized a community forum in Fort Lauderdale, Florida in November.
Florida has yet to experience the homicide, domestic violence and child abuse cases related to the drug that have overwhelmed other states, according to recent congressional hearings. But health experts at the meeting blamed the drug for the rapid climb in HIV and syphilis rates.
Part of meth’s early allure is that it gives users heightened sex drive, decreased appetite and increased attention.
As blissful as the drug makes users feel, the downward spiral is swift and excruciating, say recovering addicts. After a weekend binge, feelings of extreme depression prompt some users to call the period “suicide Tuesdays.” In the first six months of 2003, meth abuse killed about 40 people in Florida, according to DEA officials.
While addicts using other drugs can manage for decades before hitting bottom, those on meth can lose control of their lives in as little as five years. In that time, hollow-eyed addicts who don’t eat can lose their hair and teeth and develop open sores all over their face, say health experts. Long-term use results in aggressive tendencies, paranoia and obsessive behavior, such as cleaning a single drawer for hours.
The relapse rate is 94 percent, according to a recent University of California at Los Angeles study. There is no methadone-like bridge to sobriety for crystal addicts, and because its use is associated with heightened sexuality, one of the greatest triggers to relapse is sex, say local health experts.
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Cohen, with United Foundation for AIDS, said for some gay men the drug addiction is especially powerful. For those who have struggled with issues of sexual identity and feelings of insecurity, escaping through crystal meth is seductive, he said. The drug washes away those gnawing feelings and provides relief for people ostracized by family and friends because they are gay or HIV positive, Cohen said.
“There’s a lot of pain within the LGBT community,” he said. “They are so afraid of letting others know, they may turn to drugs to deal with their fear and denial. Gay crystal meth addiction becomes a very strong veneer for someone facing depression.”
