Methamphetamine - a Recipe for Disaster
| Publication year | 2004 |
| Pages | 44-53 |
| Citation | Vol. 73 No. 9 Pg. 44-53 |
73 J. Kan. Bar Assn. 9, 7-8, 44-53 (2004). Methamphetamine - A Recipe for Disaster
73 J. Kan. Bar Assn. 9, 7-8, 44-53 (2004)
Introduction
Methamphetamine. What is it? How is it made? How does it affect the user? How does it affect the nonuser? What is being done to curtail manufacture of the drug? What issues have the Kansas Supreme Court and the Kansas Court of Appeals addressed in conjunction with the drug? This article addresses these questions. Knowledge about the "devil's drug" and its impact on society is the first step to stimulating thought about how to effectively rid ourselves of methamphetamine and its curses.
The Consequences
How can I make methamphetamine? Let me count the ways ... The recipes are on the Internet and in the bookstores. Police clandestine laboratory investigators routinely explain the recipes for the manufacturing process in court under oath. You can even find recipes in Kansas' appellate decisions.(fn1) So, if the recipes are widely available in the public domain, what's the big deal?
Try long-term brain damage for starters.(fn2) This damage takes at least two forms: First, the presence of methamphetamine in the brain initiates chemical reactions that are toxic to neurons. In other words, methamphetamine deforms and kills brain cells.(fn3) Second, methamphetamine alters the way neurons communicate with each other. It causes new connections between neurons to grow, and it causes other connections to atrophy. Such new connections also occur in learning.(fn4)
As far as brain structure goes, a methamphetamine user "learns" to be an addict simply by ingesting the drug.
The Addiction Mechanism
When methamphetamine is first ingested it stimulates the brain's neurons to release dopamine, which is a neural transmitter used throughout the brain. One of the systems that primarily uses dopamine is the limbic system. This system is the center of our neural substrate for pleasure. The surplus dopamine produces effects via the limbic system, which most people experience as pleasurable. Indeed, it has been observed that the rush following ingestion can produce a sexual orgasm.(fn5)
As usage continues, the toxic effects of methamphetamine gradually reduce the ability of the user's neurons to make and use dopamine. Initially, users tend to experience diminished dopamine levels only as an increased difficulty in achieving a high as pleasurable as the last one. As their dopamine levels continue to decrease, the inability to experience highs of an intensity comparable to the first highs becomes a more generalized effect. The users find their ability to experience everyday enjoyments, pleasure in general, has become reduced. The loss of ability to experience pleasure is known as anhedonia. An almost clinical depression can result. The response of many users is to increase their dosage and, hence, their drug-seeking behavior. This response can become an obsession.
Unfortunately, more methamphetamine does not solve their problem. In physiological truth, ingesting more methamphetamine only makes the problem worse because the additional methamphetamine further reduces the brain's ability to supply dopamine while at the same time increasing its physical ability to accommodate ever larger quantities of the addictive substance through added dendrites. The neural circuitry added in response to the increased neural activity caused by the methamphetamine tends to create its own demand for more of the drug. If this demand is not met, the user experiences craving. Craving among methamphetamine users can result in intense drug-seeking behavior, which may include criminality. The damage to the brain's ability to produce and/or process dopamine is long term in heavy users, extending over several years, and may be permanent.(fn6) This may account for the stubbornly high relapse rates for methamphetamine addicts who receive treatment.
In addition to long-term brain damage and the concomitant addiction to the drug, the physical effects include severe weight loss, tooth decay, and organ damage, including inflammation of the heart lining; rapid heart rate; irregular heartbeat; increased blood pressure; and irreversible, stroke-producing damage to the small blood vessels in the brain. Hyperthermia and convulsions occur with overdoses and, if not treated immediately, can result in death.(fn7)
In summary, the addict's dopamine baseline levels drop with continued ingestion. Once they fall below what the user requires for proper functioning, the user experiences unpleasant effects, including incoordination, fatigue, anhedonia, depression, and anxiety. (A point of comparison here is that people with Parkinson's Disease also have low levels of dopamine.) The brain is unable to respond to the dopamine deficit because the drug has caused it to lose too much of its reserve supply and, over time, its ability to make replacement dopamine. All too often the users attempt to restore their now diminished sense of pleasure by ingesting the drug again. This re-initiates the cycle of excess; insufficient levels of dopamine; and the concurrent anxiety, depression, and anhedonia. The only relief for the inability to achieve what were once pleasurable responses to the everyday experiences of eating, touching, smelling, and the like, is to ingest the drug again. Hence, the addiction.(fn8) (Another point of comparison is that dopamine levels are also elevated in schizophrenics.)(fn9)
The Need For Effective Control of Methamphetamine Use is Clear
Methamphetamine is relatively easy to make. Addicts can acquire everything they need to satisfy their cravings at the local Wal-Mart or other retailer, except anhydrous ammonia (which can be easily stolen from any of the great number of tanks in farm fields anywhere in the state). Addicts are no longer dependant on a long supply chain coming up from the Caribbean or through Mexico. They and their friends can make their own any time, any place.
The ability to make the drug virtually on demand has changed law enforcement's ability to control the drug's use. Traditional methods to control supply are ineffective. In their place, law enforcement is required to try to limit access to the admittedly lawful and commercially available ingredients by means other than search warrants, arrest, and confiscation of the drugs and proceeds of the enterprise. Before looking at some new and promising ways to limit such access, it will be helpful to sketch out the basics of the manufacturing process. By understanding the role each ingredient plays in the production of the drug, differing solutions can be objectively evaluated for their likely effectiveness.
In chemical terms, the manufacturing process is straightforward: Start with a pseudoephedrine molecule and remove one oxygen atom. The resulting molecule is methamphetamine.
The removal of an oxygen atom is called a reduction. Reduction of a pseudoephedrine molecule yields a methamphetamine base. The base form is not water soluble and hence cannot be readily absorbed by the human body. To make the base molecule water soluble, and thus absorbable by a user, hydrogen chloride is added to the (base) molecule. This then is the essence of the process: Start with pseudoephedrine, remove oxygen, and add hydrogen chloride. Voila! (Perhaps we should say, "Now you're cookin'.")
The first step: Get the pseudo out of the cold pills
The technology to carry out this process is also relatively simple. It can be done at home, in a car, in a field, and with equipment consisting of common household items sold at Dollar General or Wal-Mart. Here is the basic process: First, get some pseudoephedrine, which is contained in cold pills like Sudafed. It can be removed from the pills' bindings by placing the pills in a solvent. The pseudoephedrine dissolves from the binding materials in the cold pills and is held in solution by the solvent, thereby separating it from the binding materials. Water, ether, or methanol can be used as the solvent. Methanol is the preferred solvent because it is an alcohol and evaporates faster than the water or ether, thereby accelerating the process.
After the pills are soaked for an hour or so, the entire mixture, including the binding materials and the liquid solvent that contains the pseudoephedrine, is passed through a filter, usually a coffee filter. Left in the filter is the binding material. The solvent containing the pseudoephedrine has passed on through the filter and is allowed to evaporate. What remains after evaporation is only pseudoephedrine. This is the first stage of the manufacturing process. It is usually performed using glass Mason-type jars to hold the pills and the solvent. Prior to being soaked, the pills can be crushed in a coffee grinder or similar appliance for a faster, more complete separation.
Methanol is wood alcohol and is the principal ingredient in over-the-counter gas line treatments such as HEET. Methanol is a respiration and fire hazard. Cooks may try heating the solution containing the pseudoephedrine to evaporate the methanol more quickly. Any open flame used for this purpose creates an obvious fire/explosion hazard.
The second step: Remove the oxygen atom from the pseudoephedrine molecule
The next step is the removal of an oxygen atom from the now pure pseudoephedrine molecule. Currently there are two ways to do this: One method uses lithium metal and anhydrous ammonia, and the other uses red phosphorous and iodine. Chemically, properly combining pseudoephedrine with either lithium and anhydrous ammonia or red phosphorus and iodine will cause the desired reduction to occur.
The third step: Add hydrogen chloride to the methamphet-amine base molecule
Once the reduction step is complete, the...
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