The author(s) shown below used Federal funds provided by the U.S. Department of Justice and prepared the following final report: Document Title: Methamphetamine Use: Lessons Learned Author(s): Dana Hunt, Ph.D.; Sarah Kuck; Linda Truitt, Ph.D. Document No.: 209730 Date Received: February 2006 Award Number: 99-C-008 This report has not been published by the U.S. Department of Justice. To provide better customer service, NCJRS has made this Federally- funded grant final report available electronically in addition to traditional paper copies. Opinions or points of view expressed are those of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the official position or policies of the U.S. Department of Justice. ANALYTIC SUPPORT PROGRAM CONTRACT TASK REQUIREMENT T-043: Methamphetamine Use: Lessons Learned Contract No. 99-C-008 Cambridge, MA Lexington, MA Hadley, MA Bethesda, MD Chicago, IL January 31, 2006 Prepared for Raymond C. German Contracting Officer Christine Crossland Senior Social Science Analyst National Institute of Justice Office of Justice Programs Acquisition Management Division 810 Seventh Street, SW Washington, D.C. 20001 Prepared by Dana Hunt, Ph.D. Sarah Kuck Abt Associates Inc. Linda Truitt, Ph.D. 55 Wheeler Street Cambridge, MA 02138 Contents Executive Summary...............................................................................................................iii History of Methamphetamine Use .................................................................................iii Trends.............................................................................................................................iii Characteristics of Users and Adverse Effects ................................................................ iv Trafficking, Production, Regulation................................................................................ v Treatment ....................................................................................................................... vi Introduction............................................................................................................................. 1 Chapter 1: Methamphetamine Use in the United States .................................................. 3 1.1 History of Methamphetamine ............................................................................. 3 1.2 Trends in Methamphetamine Use ....................................................................... 6 1.2.1 Methamphetamine Use, 1989-2004.......................................................... 6 1.2.2 Self-Reported Methamphetamine Use...................................................... 7 1.2.3 Administrative Datasets.......................................................................... 11 1.2.4 Interview and Bioassay Drug Use Indicators.......................................... 15 1.2.5 Private Sector Information...................................................................... 16 1.3 Who Uses Methamphetamine? ......................................................................... 18 1.3.1 Gender..................................................................................................... 19 1.3.2 Age.......................................................................................................... 19 1.3.3 Ethnicity.................................................................................................. 20 1.3.4 Methamphetamine Use Among Arrestees .............................................. 21 1.3.5 Use in Subpopulations ............................................................................ 22 Chapter 2: Production and Trafficking ........................................................................... 23 2.1. Methods of Methamphetamine Manufacture.................................................... 23 2.1.1 Sources of Methamphetamine and Precursors........................................ 23 2.1.2 Methamphetamine “Recipes” ................................................................. 23 2.1.3 Small Toxic Laboratories........................................................................ 24 2.2 U.S. and Global Markets for Methamphetamine and Precursor Chemicals..... 26 2.2.1 Sources of Methamphetamine and Precursors........................................ 26 2.2.2 Production in Superlabs .......................................................................... 31 2.2.3 Methamphetamine and International Trafficking ................................... 32 2.2.4 Chemical Diversion and Control ............................................................ 35 2.2.5 Regulating Chemicals in Other Countries .............................................. 36 2.2.6 U.S. Federal Law Enforcement and Prosecution.................................... 37 2.3 Methamphetamine Retail Markets.................................................................... 40 Chapter 3: Treatment for Methamphetamine Abuse ..................................................... 44 3.1 What Are the Effects of Methamphetamine?.................................................... 44 3.1.1 What is the effect of methamphetamine on the brain? ........................... 45 3.1.2 Child Endangerment ............................................................................... 47 Abt Associates Inc. Methamphetamine Use: Lessons Learned i 3.2 Treating Methamphetamine Abuse................................................................... 47 3.3 Pharmacotherapies ............................................................................................ 49 Chapter 4: Summary and Lessons Learned .................................................................... 51 The Case of a Rural Town............................................................................................. 53 Some Lessons Learned.................................................................................................. 54 Bibliography .......................................................................................................................... 56 Abt Associates Inc. Methamphetamine Use: Lessons Learned ii Executive Summary This report provides an overview of the methamphetamine problem in the United States. It looks at the history of the problem, trends in use, characteristics of users, adverse effects, trafficking and production and treatment issues. The analysis relies on extensive review of extant literature on the drug, analysis of existing datasets relevant to methamphetamine use, and conversations with law enforcement treatment, and government personnel dealing with the problem. History of Methamphetamine Use Amphetamines, including methamphetamine, were first synthesized in the early part of the 20th century, although they were not identified for medical use until the 1930s. First manufactured as a bronchial dilator, they were quickly prescribed for a variety of other conditions—narcolepsy, attention deficit disorder, obesity, and fatigue. With an increasing problem of abuse of these drugs due to legal availability and easy access in the 1950s and 1960s, amphetamines/methamphetamine were made Schedule II substances in 1970. Through the next decade, further restrictions on prescriptions and on the precursor chemicals needed for manufacture resulted in reductions in use nationwide. Methamphetamine had faded from a previous national popularity rivaled only by marijuana until reappearing in Hawaii and the West in the 1980s. Trends Throughout the 1990s, methamphetamine use grew steadily in the West and Northwest. By the turn of the millennium, it had reappeared in many areas of the Midwest and South and surfaced to a lesser degree in the Northeast and Mid Atlantic. In the general population, as reflected in the National Survey on Drug Use and Health (NSDUH), methamphetamine use rose from just under 2% of the adult population in 1994 to approximately 5% in 2004. Reporting on youth, Monitoring the Future (MTF) reports that amphetamine/methampheta- mine use has remained stable over the last decade for both 8th graders and 12th graders, dropping slightly in 2003. Data from the Youth Behavioral Risk Surveillance System (YBRSS) shows similarly stable, if not slightly declining, numbers of users among youth nationwide. National treatment data from the Treatment Episode Data Set (TEDS) on admissions to treatment indicate a steady rise in the number of persons nationwide who enter treatment for methamphetamine abuse. From 1992 to 2002 the rate of treatment admissions for methamphetamine abuse in the U.S. increased fivefold, from less than 1% in 1992 to over 6% in 2003. The Drug Abuse Warning Network emergency room reports show a similar trend nationally: a slight rise from just under 16,000 mentions in 1995 to 17,696 in 2002. Abt Associates Inc. Methamphetamine Use: Lessons Learned iii But National trends are seriously misleading. While national data such as these show some increases, albeit at low levels, regional data on methamphetamine use provide a far more serious picture of the problem. TEDS data show that in 1992 only two states (Hawaii and California) reported more than 5% of total treatment admissions were for methamphetamine. In 2003, 26 states reported over 5%, 8 states reported over 20%, and 2 states (Hawaii and Idaho) reported over 40% methamphetamine admissions. The highest rates were reported in Hawaii and the West, where states like Idaho reported 42%, Nevada reported 28%, and California reported 31%. Midwestern states like Iowa (20%), and Southern states like Arkansas (22%)