CRYSTAL METH FEARS SPAWN COLD-MEDICINE CRACKDOWN

REGINA -- The fight against crystal meth abuse has led western
provinces and territories to a planned crackdown on the sale of cold
medicine that contains ephedrine and pseudoephedrine, the key
ingredient in crystal meth.

At a two-day meeting on crystal meth, western ministers and government
officials agreed to come up with a plan by Oct. 1 to put restrictions
on the sale of the cold medicine.

They also agreed to hold a Western Canada clinical conference to
discuss best practices in prevention and treatment. And they called on
the federal government to toughen the laws around crystal meth and put
tighter controls on the chemicals that go into the drug with the
medicinal ingredients.

Saskatchewan Premier Lorne Calvert, who instigated and chaired the
meeting, said the use of the drug is spreading from west to east, and
governments must act before it becomes an epidemic in Canada.

"We have an opportunity here to do some preventative methods for once
and deal very clearly and definitely with crystal meth now," he said.
"It is clear that we are not an island and that this is moving. If the
United States is any example it moves quickly and it moves
dramatically.

"We have an opportunity around crystal meth to draw a line in the sand
and say 'it's just not going to happen."'

Politicians and civil servants at the meeting heard from officials in
the fields of law enforcement, prevention and treatment as well as
first-hand accounts from recovered crystal meth addicts.

North Dakota Attorney General Wayne Stenehjem, who attended the
meeting, said his state recently passed a law that restricts the
amount of cold medicine that can be sold to two packets, and forbids
its sale to minors. It also requires that purchasers must also provide
government identification, and the store must keep a log on who buys
the cold medicine. A similar law in Oklahoma helped reduce crystal
meth use in that state by about 80 per cent, he said.

Stenehjum said without restrictions on the sale of cold medicines, he
fears Canada may provide an escape valve for U.S. criminals involved
in producing meth.

"All of us fear that unless restrictions here in the western provinces
are passed, we will be exporting a product you don't want very much,
and that is our people who want to buy cold medicines and bring it
back to the States, or even worse, people who will come up here to set
up their meth cooking operations," he said.

Much of Friday's closing press conference was aimed at the federal
government, with officials urging the government to implement harsher
penalties for crystal meth possession and trafficking, expand
legislation to create offences for possession on precursor ingredients
of crystal meth, tighten licensing controls on precursors to restrict
superlabs creating crystal meth and commit adequate controls to
enforcement of precursor controls.