TIJUANA Civilian and military authorities agree that cartels no longer control drug trafficking in this city after a hard-hitting crackdown on their operations and the confiscation of their products in the last three years.
Drug abuse among the city's residents, however, has not dropped.
Why?
Dozens of small criminal groups have emerged, authorities say, and continue to supply illegal drugs to thousands of addicts.
State health authorities say that approximately 25,000 people are addicted to drugs in the
city, 65 per cent of them to methamphetamine, a number that has changed little since 2006.
"We can see when a drug becomes scarce or when consumption drops because rehab centers fill up. But that has not happened until now," said José Héctor Acosta, the director of Centro de Integración Juvenil, a non-profit medical rehabilitation center that's treated addicts for four decades.
Tijuana has the greatest drug addiction rate in Mexico, 1.5 per cent of the population, more than double the median rate (.7 per cent), say federal health authorities.
There's no single reason to explain this.
Sociologists and other experts say that part of the explanation lies in the city's proximity to the United States, where drug abuse is common.
Another reason may be that the crackdown on smugglers at the border has pressured traffickers to sell their product in the city.
Still another reason may be the spike in the number of people deported by the United States who now live in the city and have turned to drugs in their hunger and depression.
Health authorities say that 84 drug rehabilitation centers operate in city that treat nearly 8,000 people.
The number of addicts has changed little in the last five years partially because the rate of re-incidence is very high, ranging from 65 to 80 per cent. That's to say, only two or three people escape addiction.
"Generally, patients arrive five or six years after they have started abusing drugs, when they are 18 to 25 years old," Acosta said. "That's why very often one treatment is not enough."
The rehab centers located in old warehouses or converted houses offer treatment that lasts from three to 12 months, often based on the 12-step Alcoholics Anonymous program. José Ramón Arreola knows this problem well. He's the academic director of the drug rehab center called Cirad, which treats 600 addicts, about 100 of them under the age of 14.
"Everyone here can tell you how easy it is to get drugs," he said, even though there are more police officers on the street.
Methamphetamine first surfaced in the city in the 1990s, but since 2000 or so has become the most commonly abused drug, state health authorities say. Some 65 per cent of those in drug rehab are addicted to it.
Meth is a powerful stimulant made mainly with pseudoephedrine and other substances contained in cold medications and whose sale has been highly controlled in the United States.
The drug goes by many names in Mexico "speed," "tachas," and "éxtasis" among them and it has displaced cocaine, heroin and marijuana in popularity because its low cost makes it more affordable.
The synthetic drug, which comes in pill form that looks like an aspirin, is also easier to consume than other drugs and acts very quickly.
"Much of the population abuses this drug because they don't want to get depressed and this stimulates them," Acosta said.
Unlike the production of cocaine or heroin, methamphetamine does not require a sophisticated laboratory, said Rubén Sepúlveda, the director of the chemistry faculty at the Autonomous University of Baja California.
"The main ingredient to produce meth is relatively easy to get in the city's pharmacies," he said. "You don't need to be a specialist."
In the last three years authorities have shut down more than a dozen meth labs located in poor, troubled neighborhoods but acknowledge that many more continue to operate.
Acosta, the director of the rehab center, said the strategy to fight illegal drugs needs to change.
"I believe that the fierce fight against drug traffickers must be balanced with a fight against the demand for drugs," he said. "If not, the process to reduce drug abuse will take longer and be more complicated."
Omar.millan@sandiegored.com
