Crystal Meth Dangerous

I think our whole community needs to know that the problems they are having
downtown and the so called crack houses are not what they think..... it is
not crack cocaine that the younger generation is doing, it is Crystal Meth.

I read the article on Castanet this morning about the house across the street from McDonalds and I looked at the pictures in the photo gallery and these kids are doing Crystal Meth not Crack Cocaine. For one, these teenagers could not afford Crack Cocaine and Crystal Meth is far easier to get as well as one hit and you are hooked.

It is made of everything under your kitchen sink and all ingredients can be bought at your local grocery store. Dealers will go as far as delivering the Crystal Meth to their clients because it is a quick buck and customers will always call for more.

I believe that Crystal Meth is far worse to deal with then Crack Cocaine. There is extreme violence when coming down off Crystal Meth as well as the drug being so powerful it is like these kids have a split personality and the drug is the personality that does all their thinking and actions for them. (example drop in center closing due to violent behavior in patrons)

That is where the violence comes from. Parents are unaware of the warning signs, teachers also are uneducated on what to look for, kids can smoke their Crystal Meth right in school bathrooms because Crystal Meth smells like Cotton Candy, or in some cases has no smell at all. I can only stress that parents and teachers worried about what is going on in their child's/students lives educate themselves on Crystal Meth. These kids don't eat and they don't sleep for days on end and even when they rest it is disruptive and they wake up wanting more.

If we keep shutting down programs to help these kids, then we as a community are going to feel the effects , e.g. violent behavior, theft, and in some cases death. You just can't ignore it and hope it goes away because as you can see in the last year downtown Kelowna has only gotten worse not better as new teens are turned onto Crystal Meth every day.

S.M.