METH CRAZE FLIES UNDER RADAR IN BROWN CO.

Other Drugs Cause Officials More Problems

Despite growing concerns nationwide about methamphetamine, it
continues to be just a bit player in Brown County's illicit drug
scene, area experts say.

A survey released this week by the National Association of Counties
indicates that methamphetamine use accounts for more emergency room
visits than any other illicit drug, USA Today reports.

Not so at Green Bay emergency rooms.

"It's still quite uncommon, at least from what I'm seeing," said Dr.
Jane Witman, an emergency room physician at Aurora BayCare Medical
Center, 2845 Greenbrier Road, Green Bay, and a toxicologist. "I'm
sure it's out there, but not as much as some other things.

"We're seeing lots of abuse of prescription narcotics and also some
cocaine," she said.

Among patients at St. Vincent Hospital's emergency room, cocaine or
even Ecstasy show up more often than methamphetamines, said Jim Reck,
that hospital's spokesman.

Methamphetamine is a highly addictive stimulant that can be injected,
snorted, smoked or swallowed. Most methamphetamine is manufactured in
Mexican labs and smuggled into the U.S. The drug also can be cooked
up in home labs using cold pills and other ingredients easily purchased.

Nearly 12 million people in the United States have used meth at least
once in their lives, according to responses to the 2004 National
Survey on Drug Use and Health conducted by the Department of Health
and Human Services. About 1.4 million had used meth in the past year,
according to USA Today.

Witman, who has worked in her toxicology specialty in big cities,
wasn't sure why methamphetamine abuse wasn't as severe of a problem
in the Green Bay area as it is elsewhere.

"It's sort of a cultural thing," she said. "I think meth originated
in the rural areas, and it's flourished there. It can be made in
labs, but they need privacy, because it's extremely dangerous,
because it's full of toxic chemicals that are highly explosive, so
they tend to be out further."

The Brown County Drug Task Force reports that methamphetamines are
not necessarily the drug of choice for most area abusers.

According to the 2005 Comprehensive Drug Threat Assessment, a report
that the task force makes annually to the state Office of Justice
Assistance, the drug continues to pose a "low threat" to Brown County.

The availability of the drug is increasing, but the demand is low,
the assessment reports.

Since 1990, arrests for methamphetamine dealing or possession have
represented less than 2 percent of total drug-related arrests in
Brown County, according to the assessment. The biggest arrest was in
2001, when the task force arrested three men who were trying to sell
the drug. The task force seized about 40 pounds of methamphetamine
that the three had produced from six pounds of pure methamphetamine
they had brought from Arizona, according to the assessment.

Meth labs are uncommon in Brown County, in part because demand is
low, but also because importation of the drug is easier than the
manufacturing of it, according to the task force.

Whatever the reason, Witman is glad meth hasn't yet caught on here.

"This stuff is bad, bad, bad," she said. "Meth addiction is one of
the hardest to treat, and it's not a pretty sight. People lose their
teeth, they get skin lesions, and they age phenomenally rapidly. . It
can take a beautiful 17-year-old girl and make her into a hag in two years."