Get ready for meth onslaught
Since the Oct. 17 legalization of recreational cannabis, the federal and provincial governments have been preoccupied with these changes and — to a lesser extent — the consequences of making a street drug mainstream.
This focus is understandable, but it’s important not to lose sight of the devastating consequences of illegal drugs that are killing thousands of Canadians each year and wreaking havoc within communities as well as the health-care and justice systems.
The opioid crisis is one such example, and the federal government has made this a priority with a plan to fund and combat the problem.
Less attention has been paid to methamphetamine, a drug known on the streets as “crystal meth.” This has to change. Police and public health officials in Manitoba, Saskatchewan and Alberta are describing the meth crisis as an epidemic.
Meth mayhem has not reached catastrophic proportions in the Maritimes, but it is here — and police, public health officials and governments know that drug crises in Canada tend to move west to east. The experience in those provinces could be a canary in the proverbial coal mine for the rest of us.
Methamphetamine is a white, odourless powder that is taken orally, by inhaling through the nose, by injection, or by smoking. Like opioids such as fentanyl, it is highly addictive and chronic use alters the function of the brain, impairing motor and verbal skills.
In addition to the initial euphoria, it produces highly erratic and unpredictable behaviours such as paranoia, hallucinations, delusions and violent actions — conditions doctors define as amphetamine psychosis. When users overdose, they can suffer seizures, heart attacks or strokes, with sometimes lethal consequences.
There are also the health problems related to tainted drugs, as well as diseases that result from shared needles.
Chief medical examiners in the West are seeing a spike in fatalities attributed to meth in the past year, and police are blaming meth users for increases in the number of break-ins, car thefts and violent crime in communities most affected. Because meth is cheap, available, easy to make and the high lasts much longer than other street drugs such as cocaine, police believe it is becoming a choice drug for users who may also perceive it to be safer than opioids.
When a meth crisis takes hold in a community, it affects more than just the user who may be suffering from mental health issues, and conditioned by poverty or racism. The crisis affects families, victims of related crime, the justice system and the health-care sector, which is already challenged here.
In other words, meth is everyone’s crisis. We encourage the federal government to act on meth as it has on opioids with an aggressive and targeted plan, making funds available for a Four Pillars Drug Strategy focused on harm reduction, prevention, treatment and enforcement.
In the meantime, we should be preparing for the onslaught so that if and when meth hits with full force, we can take fast action and lives can be saved.