DRUG PROBLEMS FLOW BACK SOUTH OF THE BORDER

Mexico Reports Increase In Cocaine Addiction Cases

MEXICO CITY - The 39-year-old mother of three said there was no way to
escape the drug dealers who invaded her working-class neighborhood.

"On both sides of our house they sell cocaine," said Elena, who asked not
to be otherwise identified. "Many don't let their children go outside, but
you can't lock them in forever."

As a result, her 19-year-old son became addicted to what she calls "little
rocks" - crack cocaine.

Now, once a week, she takes her son to a drug-treatment center. Like many
in this city of 20 million, the clinic is filled with people seeking help
for their addictions, mostly to cocaine, according to counselors and
medical personnel.

"Three years ago, it was hard to find a patient here using cocaine," said
Marta Gutierrez, director of a treatment center in Ixtapalapa, a poor
neighborhood on Mexico City's south side. "Now it is hard to find a patient
who is not using it."

As the Clinton administration nears a Wednesday deadline to decide which
countries to certify as drug-war allies, it is becoming increasingly
apparent that what has long been considered an American problem is now
becoming a challenge for a growing number of Mexican families. Government
reports and accounts by drug counselors and medical personnel suggest that
use of illegal narcotics is on the rise in Mexico and that cocaine has
become the No. 1 drug.

A Mexican Health Department survey published last year concluded that
illegal drug use among the population increased 56 percent in the previous
five years, although the number of users is far lower than in the United
States.

Another study by the nongovernmental Center for Juvenile Integration
reported that the percentage of its young patients using cocaine had jumped
from 10 percent in 1990 to 60 percent in 1998.

Jesus Cabrera, who directs the center, says cocaine has become the drug
addiction most commonly treated at his 73 rehabilitation centers throughout
Mexico.

In a tour through Latin America last year, U.S. drug czar Barry McCaffrey
told the region's leaders that narcotics consumption was no longer just a
U.S. problem. Countries such as Mexico cannot be bases for America's drug
suppliers without also getting burned, he said.

With more children and young adults showing up at drug treatment centers,
Mexicans are viewing the drug war in a new light, analysts say. "Three or
four years ago, kids weren't being affected," says Jose Garcia, a drug-war
expert at New Mexico State University. "Mexicans weren't seeing this stuff
on the street, or seeing people drugged-up all over the place.

"Ironically," he says, "that may ultimately be the key to undoing the
cartels themselves, because of the public backlash."

Ixtapalapa is often used as a testing ground for government programs on
domestic violence or teen-age pregnancy because officials believe that the
area usually is the first to see the city's social trends.

But Ixtapalapa points to a desperate future for the drug war. The number of
patients entering the neighborhood drug treatment center has nearly tripled
in the last year, and workers at the clinic say the streets are dominated
by gangs that are selling the drug to schoolchildren as well as adults.

"The gangs are hanging out more around schools," said Gutierrez, the
treatment center's director. "Now they are threatening children to get them
to sell drugs inside the schools, where the police don't go."

Cocaine is relatively cheap and plentiful in Mexico City, officials and
drug counselors say. A gram of the drug costs about $20 on the streets,
compared to a reported range of $80 to $150 a gram in the United States.
Some analysts say that the United States may have inadvertently contributed
to the upsurge in drug use here by pushing Mexico to toe the line in the
fight against drugs.

"Some people talk about an informal agreement between the cartels and the
Mexican government. The government wouldn't come down too hard on the
traffickers, and they in turn wouldn't put drugs on the streets in Mexico,"
says Sigrid Arzt, a drug-trade researcher at the University of Miami.

But U.S. pressure to crack down on the cartels may have led Mexican
authorities to violate that understanding, Arzt says, and the cartels began
selling on the streets.

Although Mexico is expected to win certification easily as a reliable
drug-war partner this year, Washington's annual ritual and its sometimes
raucous debate in Congress still rankle many here. They view it as yet
another example of the United States' insensitivity and heavy-handedness
toward its southern neighbor.

The countries not certified by the administration, or by Congress during
its review, face economic sanctions and the loss of U.S. aid, although the
penalties can be waived.

Critics of Mexico's drug strategies say its anti-narcotics budget focuses
on big operations against the cartels to the detriment of the neighborhoods.

The Mexican government, they say, spent $170 million last year on drug
interdiction, much of it to acquire new ships, helicopters and satellite
tracking technology -- all of little use in fighting street drugs.

"All the money is going into interception, seizures and arresting the big
fish in the cartels, but that is a response to American pressure," Arzt
says. "The Americans couldn't care less what is happening on Mexico's
streets."