TULSA, Okla. – A few years ago, Congress enacted strict laws that put cold and allergy medications behind pharmacy counters and off store shelves, including convenience stores, with the intent to curb the illegal manufacturing of methamphetamine — one of the world’s most addictive drugs — by eliminating large purchases of pills that contain pseudoephedrine, the key ingredient to making meth.
As the saying goes, where there’s a will, there’s a way: A new formula for meth includes “a two-liter soda bottle, a few handfuls of cold pills and some noxious chemicals,” reports the Associated Press.
The “traditional” way of making large amounts of meth requires an elaborate lab, with flammable liquids and hundreds of pills containing pseudoephedrine. Now, meth makers have found an easier way to make smaller batches cheaper and with simple ingredients — what’s being called as the “shake-and-bake” approach because all of the ingredients can be carried in nothing more than a knapsack.
This new method allows meth makers to effectively skirt federal law, which bans customers from purchasing more than 9 grams of medications containing pseudoephedrine, which amounts to about 300 pills a month. The pills are crushed, combined with some common household chemicals and then shaken in the soda bottle. Now, meth makers can easily turn a bathroom stall or even their car into a makeshift “lab.”
“Somebody somewhere said ‘Wait, this requires a lot less pseudoephedrine, and I can fly under the radar,’” Mark Woodward, spokesman for the Oklahoma Bureau of Narcotics and Dangerous Drugs Control, told the Associated Press.
Although no flame is required to make the meth the new way, a deadly explosion is still possible, which makes it just as dangerous.
“If there is any oxygen at all in the bottle, it has a propensity to make a giant fireball,” Sgt. Jason Clark of the Missouri State Highway Patrol's Division of Drug and Crime Control told the news source. “You're not dealing with rocket scientists here anyway. If they get unlucky at all, it can have a very devastating reaction.”
Police in Alabama, Oklahoma in particular have linked dozens of flash fires this year to meth manufacturing. “Every meth recipe is dangerous, but in this one, if you don't shake it just right, you can build up too much pressure, and the container can pop,” Woodward said.
Historically, rural states such as Oklahoma, Missouri and Kansas have been plagued with meth manufacturing because of the availability of anhydrous ammonia, which is used as a fertilizer and commonly found on farms. Now, the new method uses ammonium nitrate, “a compound easily found in instant cold packs that can be purchased at any drug store,” writes the news source.
Some state law enforcement agencies are “rushing” to close loopholes in laws that limit the sale of the ingredients used to make meth. According to Mississippi state Sen. Sid Albritton, state law forces buyers of cold and allergy medications to show ID and make stores keep a log of the sales. However, the state is lacking the technology to log the purchases into a central database.
“You have to understand going in that drugs are an evolutionary process,” Albritton told the news source. “The day after we pass a law, they are going to look for ways to circumvent that.”