FEDS NEEDED TO FIGHT METH USE

Methamphetamine wasn't seen locally until the late 1990s, but it has
already taken a tragic toll on Ohio and Kentucky families and government
budgets. Clermont County this November is asking voters to raise taxes to
care for children of addicts. Kentucky has restricted the retail purchases
of cold medication that can be used to make meth.

It is time for a comprehensive federal plan to help local governments fight
this drug problem - chiefly through treatment, rehabilitation centers and
support for children's services.

After years of being accused of neglecting the problem, the Bush
administration Friday sent three top administrators to Nashville, Tenn.,
drug court and announced a three-year, $16.2 million aid plan. That plan
will provide a forensic science training laboratory to educate federal,
state and local law enforcement officers and chemists in the production of
meth so that they are better equipped to investigate meth cases.

It's a good start, but more needs to be done. Congressmen and senators can
draft bills to fund prevention measures through grants at the local level.
They can draft stronger drug-control efforts.

Meth, which is smoked, eaten or snorted, immediately affects the central
nervous system, causing a euphoric high that can last for hours. And it's
cheap to make. It can be produced for as little as $50 in supplies. But its
after-effects are devastating. Users become emaciated, suffer severe tooth
decay partly because hydrochloric acid in the meth eats their teeth. They
can also develop psychosis linked to violent behavior.

Perhaps worse, there are hundreds of cases in which children are taken from
their homes because their parents become addicted to meth, or make meth in
their homes, exposing them to toxic fumes. In Kentucky, convicted meth
makers serve a minimum of 10 years, but the sentence is longer if meth is
made in the presence of children.

Meth use and production have particularly hurt Clermont County, which has
spent hundreds of thousands of dollars closing down meth labs and taking
care of meth orphans.

With 105 reported cases since 2000, Clermont ranks second in the state
behind Summit County in northeast Ohio as a haven for meth labs, according
to a recent report by the Cleveland Plain Dealer. In November, Clermont
voters will be asked to increase a $1.5 million children's services levy to
help take care of the children taken from their drug-addicted or
meth-making parents. In the past four years, the number of children in the
foster care system there has risen from 161 to 315, and meth abuse is one
of the big reasons.

Another big problem lies in the lack of treatment for addicts.

The Louisville Courier-Journal last year cited a study by the University of
Kentucky Center on Drug and Alcohol Research that found that as many as 80
percent or potentially about 9,800 of the 12,300 inmates in Kentucky
prisons have drug or alcohol problems. Only about 19 percent get treatment.
Corrections officials say more prisoners are getting treatment now.

In March, partly in response to the Courier-Journal's piece, Kentucky
passed a law to restrict the sale of pseudoephedrine, the ingredient found
in cold medicine used to make meth. Ohio lawmakers are considering a
similar bill.

States and local governments can only do so much to fight the affects of
meth. We need federal policies to shore up their efforts.