Meth Addiction

Has anyone seen Breaking Bad? It is a great TV show on AMC but one of the drugs they make is methamphetamine or also known as crystal meth, crank, or speed. This is a recreational drug that someone figured out can get you high from cold medicine. We all know that cough syrup has alcohol which gets you drunk in large enough quantities.  There was a time before the meth addiction outbreak, where you could walk into the pharmacy and buy cold medicine over the counter. As you can tell,  now it is highly controlled due to homemade chemists who try to make batches of meth for themselves.

Meth Effects

The active ingredients from cold medicine such as Sudafed is ephedrine and pseudoephedrine. These are the precursors to meth. I am not going to tell you how to make it. There are so many other websites that can do that for you.  I will explain to you what happens to an individual who has a meth addiction. It is in the same class of drugs as heroin or cocaine but this drug gets you addicted from the moment you try it.

Methamphetamine is actually well studied. It is known to have effects such as increased sexual desire, increased alertness, lift moods and increase energy. No need for Viagra with this drug. There are very serious side effects when abused. Meth leads to psychosis, brain hemorrhages, depression and a breakdown of skeletal muscle tissue. In essence your body starts to degrade. If you don’t believe me just google faces of meth and see their before and after pictures. Trust the ones posted by the various police departments. There is even a website that will show you what you will look like with constant use of meth.

http://www.methproject.org/answers/will-using-meth-change-how-i-look.html#Mug-Shot-Match-Up

Meth and The Environment

Meth is an environmental hazard due to how it is processed illegally. This is not a do it in the home project.  The process to create meth has odorous toxic fumes which need to be ventilated. These odors can linger for long periods of time in a basement or apartment whereby making it uninhabitable if not removed. The process can also flash in an instant if not monitored creating fires or explosions. If it is not done properly, you can either cause a fire, kill yourself from the fumes or even worse, kill someone else.There have been cases where the excess chemicals were dumped in a forest, killing plant life in  large area around the dump site and contaminating water supplies.

Have you ever heard of a meth lab exploding in your area?