‘Drug of choice’: NZ meth use hits unprecedented levels

the state of myth in our country. Jared, Look, it comes as no surprise when we say myth is popular in New Zealand, but just how prevalent is it?

whether the trend is going up or down. And so for about the past six years they've been running this program and sort of use just fluctuated sort of between ten to twenty kilos per week, and there were some big sort of factors in the ten kilo at the lower limit that was when New Zealand was a complete lockdown during early twenty twenty, and then the peak of twenty kilos it was about a year later when the world had opened up a little bit there was a

bit more travel and freight coming back and forth. But of course Auckland was in lockdown at that point and there was a lot of people similarly using meth during that time, and it peaked at about twenty kilos, so between ten and twenty kilos over the past sort of six years and normally in the middle of that, sort of hovering around the sort of the fifteen kilo mark, and that's where it was in June last year, just over fifteen kilos, and then from July to December last year,

the wastewater testing showed a huge increase, so going from fifteen kilos each week to thirty kilos each week for the second half of last year, and it peaked in October with about thirty nine nearly forty kilos of myth being consumed each and every week last year. So you know, it's doubled, it's doubled from the peak, and it's doubled from what has sort of historically been this sort of

traditional midpoint that we've seen. And it's it's quite an alarming discovery that we've found through the wastewater data.

large amount. So the market here is saturated. It's been flooded with metham betamine and other drugs, but mostly metham betamine, and that has led to more supply equals cheaper prey equals more consumption, and that's pretty much what it boils down to.

and not spend any more money. And so that's the cheaper prices have come from the market being flooded and more myth being used. Chris Wilkins was interviewed with the story and he said all the metrics going in the wrong direction on this, and he described it as a wake up call.

as lucrative. So that is why we're being targeted by Mexican CATAUS Southeast Asian organized crime groups who work candy glove here with sort of organized crime figures here, including sort of the outlaw motorcycle groups you know, in particular sort of you know, the common Cero's and some of those other five x one gangs that have really elevated that they've got true international connections with these groups overseas, and that's elevated the supply and that's led to what

we're seeing here with with far greater consumption. Literally the figure is doubling last year.

disproportionately affected by methan betamine. Their sort of average per capita consumption is often far greater than the national average. So you know, there's some big headlines last year about this this raid, these raids, this COVID investigation called Operation high water in a podoquy, and that led about twenty odd members of the Mong the Barbarians Chapter and their associates being being arrested and charged with various drug dealing

and money laundering offenses. Now that's all before the courts and you know, yet to be proven. But what the wastewater shows is that after those raids was a dramatic decrease in methectomy consumption and a podokey. So I think in the month leading up to the raids it was around about one hundred and nineteen grands per week was being consumed in a podige, which is a bear in mind a small town of about five or six thousand people.

Following month that dropped down to sixty six grands, so nearly hard So whilst the rest of the country was going up, a podokey went down following the raids, and then the next month that went down again to fifty four grands a week, again while the rest of the

country went up. And so you know that indicates that sort of strong and fours does have an impact in terms of in terms of consumption because obviously they're cutting off the supply or the major supply into the town because members of the Munger Mob and at the same time, the police are also kind of being that. They run a program called the Revilliance to Organize Crime and Community.

So that's it's called ROCK ROCC and that's where like dedicated police stuff sort of work hand in hand with community community leaders and NGOs and EWE to sort of support sort of meth harm production program. So they'll go and do a big raide, you know, and years gone by, you know, the police would that was their job. They would go and do that and sort of walk away

to the to the next, to the next operation. In this case, they're working in there with with local families to make sure that you know, they're getting food on the table, getting their kids to school, getting how it preferred into the meth amphetames, sort of education programs and rehab that that kind of work there on the head of the Rock Program. Infected Jock o Keep said it's been about seven hundred and twenty thousand and funding been guarded to sort of keep supporting the work that the

local groups, the local community leaders and ewi's are already doing. So, yeah, there is a glimmer of hope out there, and of.

from China. That was a huge deal. It was seen as an outlier for about ten years, and then we saw five hundred and one kilos sort of wash up on the beach that famous case Operation Frontier up in Northland. And then from then, I mean now five hundred kilo stezias are almost routine. So certainly one hundred kilos is a routine now and so we're seeing four or five,

six hundred. I think the biggest at the border Caesar is about seven hundred and thirteen kilos that was hidden inside maple syrup bottles which had been imported from Canada. Although it's I guess it's suspected that the myth would have been transshipped from Mexico up to Canada and then to New Zealand where it was caught. So we are seeing huge, huge amounts of you know, busts happening every year, I guess, And people might look at that and go, oh,

that's great, we're catching more. Well, I think the opposite is true. We're catching these bigger amounts because more is being seent here and that sort of you know, and that has been sort of born out in the wastewater of data that we seeing where we're stopping more than ever at the border, but we are consuming way more than ever, And I guess that shows how saturated the market really is.

substance and then poured into an umbrella stand. So they were being imported in the country as umbrella stands, and the organized crime Syndicate it had sent people to New Zealand set up these businesses to import umbrella stands amongst other furniture, and when it got here, they were then breaking up the umbrella stands with you know, drills and hammers and bits and pieces, and then running it through a fairly complicated sort of process to break it back

down into myth and then being sold. I think it was about one hundred and eighty kilos or something. It was a big amount, But that's probably the best concealment I've seen. But I mean, of course, another trend that we've seen of later is organized crime groups not even

needing to hide or conceal the myth anymore. You know, there's been some quite well documented cases of corruption within the airports and at the port of Auckland, the port of Turnongar, where you know, these prime groups and outlaw motorcycle gangs have insiders working there. Cramped insiders who are you know, are paid to essentially facilitate the smuggling of the drugs straight in. And often the drugs aren't even hidden,

they're just sort of boxed up normal cardboard boxers. But if you've got someone in there who can move things around and get it out of the warehouse before it can be checked and so on, they're no one is having a door into the country. And it's often as simple as that for these groups.

collar party drug, but sexier perhaps in those circles. And that's the myth is coming through in the same supply pipelines, So the cocaine is coming through the same supply pipelines as meth and beeta means obviously cocaine comes from South America through Mexico, with the same kind of cartels there bringing it in and supplying it here to the outlaw motorcycle gangs and many of whom had the origins in Australia, where cocaine is a much bigger market, so they're kind

of bringing in the cocaine and trying to establish the market here. It has grown from a small base in the last few years, and we've definitely seen that more

and more. I mean, you know, again HARKing back showing my age here, but HARKing back set of fifteen years ago, cocaine was a very tiny amount and we're now seeing some quite large shipments coming into New Zealand, often rivaling the size of some of the meth some of the meath shipments that we're having though the suspicion is is that a big chunk of those cocaine shipments coming here to New Zealand have then been transshipped to the bigger

market in Australia as well. So it's all part of the same organized crime ecosystem that we're seeing with methban pedimen.

ends of this. The overarching commitment we've got in an ever changing risk environment is this is not just a law enforcement problem. We are reaching out to our industry partners to make sure that they have the tools and the information available to them to also strengthen the supply chain.

the same page that really. Whilst law enforcements still needs to be tackling the high ends, you know, the high end suppliers, and obviously a lot of money can be made from them, so tackling those high end suppliers must continue. But like you know, you take out it, you take out a crime syndicate, well somebody else will replace them and sort of fill that vacuum quite quickly. So I

mean everyone's on the same sort of page. Around We need to be tacking the demand for drugs as well, and a lot of that comes back to treating meth using and meth addiction in particular as a health issue, not necessarily locking people up, but sort of referring them into health programs to sort of get the help and the counseling that they need, but also probably far greater education amongst children basically not just teenagers, but children around

the harm that can be caused by METAM better mean and particular and really getting into that sort of prevention space, we would need far more sort of resources being put into that. At the moment in comparison, it would be a bit of a drop in the bucket. So yeah, there's no solution to this. And I don't think there's always going to be a demand well drugs and there's always going to be people wanting to make money from supplying them,

so keeping that high in enforcement is crucial. But yeah, far more money needs to be sort of directed towards health and education programs, particularly in the smaller rural communities that you know, further further away from the big centers where you might have more sort of drug rehab help available. And it's often the smaller towns that they are the ones getting the hit the hardest.