ILLINOIS BEGINS VIDEO CAMPAIGN AGAINST METH

A girl says she would rather have gotten into a car accident than
gone to the party where she first tried methamphetamine. A child
recalls making pancakes with her father before he became addicted to
the drug and disappeared from her life. A woman talks about losing
custody of her son when she was hooked on meth.

These real testimonials are part of a dramatic new advertising
campaign launched in Illinois and seven other states with high rates
of meth use by White House drug czar John Walters. The $10 million
campaign aims to raise awareness about the dangers of meth and about
the availability of treatment.

"It's both trying to prevent use of the drug as well as showing
people that there is hope," said Stephen Schatz, a spokesman for the
Office of National Drug Control Policy. "Unfortunately, there is this
perception out there that you can't recover from meth addiction."

The campaign targets 18- to 34-year-olds, who use the drug at a
greater rate than other age groups, with print, radio, television and
online ads. It was slated to run through March in Alaska, Washington,
California, Oregon, Iowa, Illinois, Indiana and Kentucky - all
states with high levels of meth availability and treatment admission
rates.

The ads can be viewed on the campaign's Web site at
www.methresources.gov, where information about treatment options also
is available.

"Any prevention that can be done is worthwhile," said Dr. Abhin
Singla, an addictionologist who practices in Joliet. "I would put
meth up there with most of the hard-core drugs that are very
difficult to treat; it really quickly creates a lot of destruction in
someone's life."

The highly-addictive drug can precipitate depression, severe tooth
decay, and high blood pressure and heart rates that can lead to
stroke, heart failure and death.

Joanna Zoltay, a spokeswoman for the Chicago office of the Drug
Enforcement Agency, said Illinois has seen an increase in trafficking
of meth from Mexico since legislation aimed at cracking down on
homegrown labs by limiting the sale of products with pseudoephedrine
- - the key ingredient in meth - went into effect last year.

The imported meth is "not as pure, but just as deadly," she
said.

Meth is a highly-addictive stimulant that can be smoked, inhaled,
injected, or taken orally. It can be manufactured by combining
chemicals found in over-the-counter medications and household products.

The presence of the drug has remained low in the Chicago area, but
the city has become a distribution hub for meth produced south of the
border, according to the drug control policy office.

And despite the new law, some mom-and-pop meth shops still operate
around the state.

In 2006, there were 778 meth lab seizures in Illinois, according to
the DEA. That's down from the 1,189 labs that were dismantled in
2005, but Singla said the availability of imported meth will keep the
market robust.

"We see a fair amount of it in Joliet and Chicago, and it's probably
going to get bigger," he said.

A 2005 survey conducted by the U.S. Department of Health and Human
Services found that 10.4 million Americans age 12 and older have used
meth at least once in their lives. In 2006, there were 259,000 people
who tried the drug for the first time, and the mean age of the
initiates was 22.2 years old.