It has been one month since the state passed a law restricting the sales and purchasing procedures of over-the-counter drugs containing a certain form of pseudoephedrine. This chemical and other ingredients can be mixed together to form the drug methamphetamine. Here’s a look at the new law, the presence of meth from a national to a local level and the effects it has had on campus.
A break down of the law
If you have come down with a cold in the past month and needed to purchase cold medication, you may have noticed a few changes at your local pharmacy.
On Aug. 1, Texas enacted House Bill 164 into law. The act outlines the civil and criminal consequences and guidelines concerning the manufacture, distribution and retail sales of pseudoephedrine.
The retail sales guidelines require pharmacies and any store that carries pseudoephedrine-based products to place some over-the-counter drugs, such as Sudafed, behind the counter. To purchase these drugs, the law now requires customers to request the drug at the pharmacy or from a sales clerk with access to the product.
The law limits each customer to six grams (two packages) of the product per month. Each store is required to track customers’ purchases by recording the purchaser’s name (verified by a driver’s license), date of birth, purchase date, the product name and the number of items sold. Records are not entered into a database but should be maintained for at least two years after the sale.
SMU law professor Tom Mayo said the new law increases the transactional costs of meth users obtaining it.
And legislative aid Toby Baker agreed. As he pointed out, the new law does not prevent people from obtaining the drug, but limits intake and serves as a deterrent.
“Some people will try to avoid this restriction [the law] by hitting each corner store or pharmacy around the city, filling their trunks with these products to either use or sell,” Baker said. “But if there’s any suspicion of someone hopping from store to store, authorities can pull the log book to track them down.”
Baker said the new system is designed to make it easier for authorities like the Drug Enforcement Administration and the Department Public Safety to pinpoint possible drug rings.
National presence
A national study entitled “The Meth Epidemic in America” and released by the National Association of Counties in July 2005 reported the Southwest as the leader in methamphetamine problems. According to the study, the Southwest leads the nation in methamphetamine related arrests with a 96 percent growth in reported arrest numbers in the past three years. The study did not list Texas as one of the states among the highest percentage of meth-related arrests. Last year, the Southwest also topped meth drug-related arrests at 76 percent, and this number continues to increase.
Regional presence
According to a study released in February 2005 by the Drug Policy Information Clearinghouse in 2002, 28 percent of those sentenced by a federal court were charged with committing a drug offence. Meth was involved in 34.8 percent of the drug cases, leading all drug categories.
On May 2, 2003, the Dallas County Sherrif’s Office, Immigration and Customs Enforcements and the North Texas HIDTA
Local presence
National statistics reveal that meth users are typically high school or college age students, white and blue-collar workers and the unemployed in the age range of 20 to 30 in rural and emerging urban areas.
John Sanger, a drug counselor who has been working with SMU students for several years, has only seen one report of meth use on campus. “I don’t think it’s a common drug abused on college campuses,” he said, adding that marijuana and alcohol use is more common.
SMU Police Department discovered a portable (makeshift) meth lab in a piano practice room of the Owens Fine Arts Center in 2002. A member of the custodial staff discovered paraphernalia and the preliminary residue of meth the Monday following fall break, according to the SMU Police.
An SMU criminal investigation revealed that the chemicals and equipment found in Owens were used as a lab to produce the early stages of methamphetamine.
Dallas Police Crime and Risk Management assisted in gathering evidence and removing chemical residue from the room. Samples of the residue found in two containers were sent to Southwestern Forensic Lab.
Police still have not solved the case but believe a non-affiliated person or persons were responsible because the lab was discovered the Monday after fall break.