THE Australian Crime Commission have warned the nation the size of the ice problem is reaching pandemic proportions.

And Prime Minister Tony Abbott admits the war on drugs is unwinnable.

It comes as the Herald Sun revealed growing police concerns about the ice pandemic sweeping Victoria, prompting Victoria Police deputy commissioner Graham Ashton to issue a chilling warning to all parents in country Victoria about the ice plague.

“It is clear that an entire generation of rural youth is at risk, threatening the future prosperity of those communities,” he told the Herald Sun.

EDITORIAL: UGLY ICE AGE HITS VICTORIA

Deputy Commissioner Ashton revealed bikie gangs and overseas criminal syndicates were taking advantage of the highly addictive aspect of ice “to actively hook thousands of young Victorians”.

Speaking on radio this morning, Mr Abbott vowed his Government would fight the drugs scourge as fiercely as humanly possible.

“It’s not a war we will ever finally win,” he said on 3AW.

“The war on drugs is a war you are going to lose.

“You may not ever win it, but you’ve always got to fight it.”

Victorian health and drug policy boss John Ryan today warned overdose deaths from ice were increasing and were now second only to heroin.

The Penington Institute chief executive officer also said he feared many ice users would move from smoking ice to injecting it, putting them at risk of getting blood-borne diseases such as HIV and hepatitis.

Mr Ryan said the Penington Institute had been working extensively on the ice issue throughout Victoria, speaking with thousands of frontline service workers as well as concerned community members.

media_camera Deputy Commissioner Graham Ashton says the ice scourge is a huge challenge for authorities.

“Based on our work throughout the community it is clear that methamphetamine can affect people and their families quickly, and in many physical, psychological, emotional and financial ways,” he told the Herald Sun.

“We talk regularly to grass roots health services right across the country, and there have been worrying signs that ice use is growing.

“Only a small percentage of ambulance attendances for an opiate overdose end up in a trip to hospital.

“More than 70 percent of methamphetamine callouts do – so as a drug, it can have more impact on the emergency health system than heroin.

“The number of overdose deaths involving methamphetamine in Victoria has risen from 14 in 2010 to 50 in 2013, now second to heroin as an illicit drug contributing to overdose deaths in this state.

“Tackling methamphetamine requires a large investment, with additional focus on reducing the harm amongst those using it.

media_camera Evidence pictures from the seizure by state and federal authorities in Brooklyn of 200kg of methamphetamine hidden in the tyres of a truck being shipped to Melbourne.

“Forget about old-fashioned messages based on scaremongering. Simplistic fear-based campaigns will backfire.

“Individuals and families must have factual information and far more support.

“Collaboration is required, including with police, health and community services at grassroots community levels.

“I fear that many people who’ve started out smoking crystal meth will transition to injection, particularly if the price of it goes up.

“This has enormous implications for blood-borne virus transmission.”

Mr Abbot will have an ally in his drugs fight in Opposition Leader Bill Shorten.

media_camera Federal Agent Paul Jevtovic says the scale of the problem is nationwide.

Mr Shorten today rang the Herald Sun to congratulate it on its coverage today of the ice pandemic wreaking havoc in Victoria and elsewhere in Australia.

“Your story on ice was very timely as it is a real issue in our community,” he said.

“It doesn’t always make it to the national political issue of the day, but for a lot of people it’s a more immediate challenge than a lot of the other stuff we bang on about.

“Ordinary people have raised it with me because it goes to the safety of our kids. It goes to crime on our streets.

“Ice hooks people and it hurts people.

“I was just thinking when I read the Herald Sun article today, just think about the families who have had one of their family members hooked and they have got themselves into terrible strife.

“That’s real misery.”

Mr Abbott said his Government was committing more money to border protection.

“We have got new anti-gang strike teams in every state I think,” he said.

“Certainly in Victoria we established one a few months ago to work against the gangs that are promoting this evil trade.”

The ACC will on today use a Melbourne press conference to release a report on illicit drug use in Australia which calls for a broader approach than currently exists to crack down on the ice pandemic — saying it is not just a law enforcement issue.

It will also reveal:

media_camera Maddison Murphy West. Police believe her killer had a raging ice habit.

ALMOST 20 tonnes of illegal drugs worth $2.7 billion were seized in Australia during the past year.

THE number of performance and image enhancing drugs detected at the Australian border in the past decade has increased by 751 per cent, with the 10,356 detections in 2012-13 being the biggest ever.

THERE were record numbers of seizures in Australia last year of cannabis, ecstasy, heroin, cocaine, amphetamine-type stimulants and steroids.

ICE sold in Victoria is easily the purest available in Australia, with the median purity level jumping from 20 per cent to 76.1 per cent in just the past two years.

VICTORIA last year had the biggest percentage increase of any state in seizures of ice and other amphetamines, with more than 1.8 tonnes grabbed in what was a 35 per cent increase in the number of busts.

IRANIAN, West African and Chinese organised crime gangs are supplying significant amounts of amphetamines to South-East Asia for domestic consumption and transhipment to other international markets, including Australia.

media_camera Bikies and other crime groups are cashing in on the methamphetamine trade.

AUSTRALIANS are increasingly buying hallucinogenic magic mushrooms over the internet from the Netherlands and Canada and having them posted to themselves.

MORE than 100,000 people were arrested for drug offences in Australia in 2012-13.

Deputy Commissioner Ashton said Victoria had never before experienced an illegal drug problem as bad as the ice one it was currently facing.

“This is because of the highly addictive nature of this drug and consequences of the violent behaviour it can often induce,” he said.

“Ice does not discriminate. It is addicting the children of the rich and the poor alike.

“The violent behaviour often associated with ice use also leads to increases in family violence, road trauma, and other violent crimes.

“One in five ice users arrested by police committed a violent crime.

‘’Victoria Police seizures of ice have increased 35 per cent in 2013 and 30 per cent in 2012.

“Victoria Police seeks to target high level traffickers and organisers through our joint law enforcement activity, which in addition to our traditional drug task force and clandestine laboratory squad, also includes the Trident Task Force which disrupts crime at the Victorian waterfront, and the joint organised Crime task force which incorporates the anti-gangs task force.

‘’Between July 2012 and October 2013, joint law enforcement activity has resulted in the seizure of 2500 kilos of precursors and 550 kilos of methylated amphetamine.

“The ice problem requires a whole of government and whole of society response. Health experts, educators, police, community leaders, and importantly parents all have a major role to play.’’

Federal Justice Minister Michael Keenan will launch the ACC report in Melbourne.

“We’re detecting more criminals and disrupting more illicit drugs before they hit the streets,” he told the Herald Sun.

“We are determined to undermine the business models of organised crime and combat the scourge of these drugs.”

The Herald Sun recently revealed Victoria Police has investigated 14 homicides in as many months in which the suspected killers are thought to have been on ice.

Victims included Kara Doyle, 24, whose boyfriend blasted her with a sawn-off shotgun after an ice bender last year and Maddison Murphy-West, 20, whose suspected killer had a raging ice habit.

media_camera Kara Doyle is among the victims of the ice pandemic.

Acting ACC boss Paul Jevtovic warns in the report that the market for the production, distribution and use of ice in Australia is entrenched and of “national concern”.

“With its relative accessibility, affordability and destructive side-effects, crystal methylamphetamine is emerging as a pandemic akin to the issue of crack cocaine in the United States,” he said.

“Central to addressing an issue of this scale are holistic responses aimed at reducing demand, supply and harm — the three pillars of the national drug strategy.

“Illicit drugs are not just a law enforcement issue.

“A broader approach is required, including cooperation, collaboration and participation of a diverse range of sectors.

“Crime groups thrive on the profits generated through the illicit drug market and accordingly continue to be a key focus of our response.

“Illicit drug use in Australia — and the profits gained from it — is directly linked to transnational organised crime groups that are implicated in large-scale criminality and corruption overseas.”

The ACC’s national manager of strategic intelligence, Hamish Hansford, told the Herald Sun organised crime gangs are flooding Australia with ice and other illegal drugs because Australians are prepared to pay world record prices for them.

He said the international gangs were singling Australia out as a great place to do business.

Mr Hansford will be outlining the size of Australia’s ice problem at a press conference in Melbourne today to launch the ACC’s Illicit Drug Data Report.

“Organised crime sees Australia as one of their most lucrative markets because of the mark up available to them here of all their illicit drug products,” Mr Hansford said.

“I think people don’t realise that we are one of the world leaders in terms of price at up to $320,000 a kilo of crystal meth (ice).

“Not too many markets in the world command that price, that profitability — and organised crime is exploiting that.

“For example, in the United States the average price there is about $100,000 per kilo and in China it’s about $7000 a kilo.

“With cocaine, in Columbia it’s about $3000 a kilo and by the time it gets to Australia it’s worth $190,000 to $250,000 a kilo, depending on where you are in Australia.

“That’s a great mark up and a massive profit for organised criminals.”

ACC intelligence also shows Australians pay up to four times as much for an ecstasy tablet than users elsewhere in the world do.

Mr Hansford said organised crime was aware Australians have a particularly high disposable income after decades of economic growth.

“They also know there is obviously still a strong desire by Australians to take illegal drugs,” he said.

“There is this whole culture here of young people who are getting beefed up muscles and using image enhancing drugs.

“When they buy steroids, for example, they come into contact with organised crime in gyms and they start to cultivate relationships with criminals and get into heavier commodities like crystal meth.”

Mr Hansford said there was a belief among some young Australians that ice was a cool drug because it helped them dance all night at clubs and supposedly improved their sexual performance.

“What they don’t think about are its many negatives,” he said.

“You only need to look at an image of someone before they became a user and then after and you see a whole change in their face.

“You see what’s called ‘meth mouth’, which is the loss of teeth.

“Then you see the marks on their faces and elsewhere as they have been scratching at their skin because their flesh feels like it is crawling.”

media_camera Mugshots showing the effects of methamphetamine drug addiction in the "Faces of Meth" campaign from Oregon in the US.

Also at today’s Melbourne launch of the ACC drugs report at the Alfred hospital will be the chief executive of Odyssey House in New South Wales, James Pitts, who has seen first-hand the horrors of ice use.

His drug rehabilitation service has had to retrain staff to handle ice addicts because they are so much more dangerous and difficult to deal with than other drug users.

“Ice is such a big problem because of the number of negative effects, such as inducing violence, it has on people,” Mr Pitts told the Herald Sun.

“With a drug like heroin, people are usually very placid once they inject or use whatever their root of administration is.

“They are pretty much out of it, they are calm.

“Conversely, with amphetamine-type stimulants, particularly ice, there is a completely different action because it acts on the central nervous system as a stimulant.

“So the users initially have a heightened sense of wellbeing and confidence. They have an ‘I can rule the world’ feeling.

“The problem with ice is that kind of wellbeing, that sense of confidence, converts after a period of time into paranoia, agitation and feeling that people are trying to do things to you.

“That’s where the violence aspect comes in. Either a person becomes overly aggressive because of a comment somebody may have made or there is a perception that somebody is trying to harm them in some way and violence ensues.

“The biggest negative with ice is the fact that it doesn’t allow people to sleep and you need sleep so you can maintain some kind of sense of psychiatric balance.

“Because ice users are up for two or three days or more at a time they have a distortion of reality.

“They have a propensity to hear voices and display delusional behaviour. They become agitated, anxiety sets in and they are prone to violence.”

media_camera The drug ice, also known as crystal meth or methamphetamine.

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ICE FACTBOX

The most common forms of amphetamine are powder and tablets or capsules.

Methylamphetamine has four common forms — tablet, crystal, base (also referred to as

paste) and powder (also referred to as speed) — with powder the most common form

used in Australia.

Crystal methylamphetamine, often referred to as ice or crystal meth, is a highly purified form that is crystalline in appearance.

Intelligence obtained by the ACC reveals the median purity of ice on sale in Victoria is the highest in Australia at 76.1 per cent pure, compared with between 50 and 68 per cent in other states.

Ice is generally heated and the vapours inhaled. It may also be injected after being dissolved in water.

Due to slight structural differences, methylamphetamine produces a stronger nervous

system response than amphetamine.

Short-term effects of amphetamine and methylamphetamine use may include sweating, headaches, insomnia, anxiety and paranoia. High doses can result in blurred vision, hallucinations, tremors and stroke.

Long-term use may result in severe dental problems, reduced immunity, high blood

pressure, depression, impaired memory and concentration, deficits in motor skills,

aggressive or violent behaviour, anxiety, cardiovascular problems and kidney failure.

media_camera Evidence pictures from the seizure by state and federal authorities in Brooklyn of 200kg of methamphetamine hidden in the tyres of a truck being shipped to Melbourne.

SEIZURES

Significant seizures of ice and amphetamine-type stimulants in Australia during 2012—13 included:

*585kg of crystal meth hidden in sea cargo going from China to Sydney in February 2013.

*363.8kg of liquid meth detected in April 2013, suspended in

96 bottles of carpet cleaning products, via sea cargo from China to Melbourne.

*306kg of crystal meth detected in July 2012, concealed in

3,200 terracotta pots, via sea cargo from Thailand to Sydney.

*200kg of crystal meth hidden in truck tyres and seized in Melbourne in October 2013.

*75kg of crystal meth detected in May 2013, concealed in sofas

and chairs, via sea cargo from China to Sydney.

*72.9kg of liquid meth detected in May 2013, concealed and

suspended in shampoo and conditioner, via sea cargo from China to Sydney.

keith.moor@news.com.au

MORE REPORTS

TIDE OF EVIL: ICE LINKED TO 14 KILLINGS IN VICTORIA

MILDURA’S PAIN: MUM’S VOW TO TAKE A STAND ON ICE

ALARM: METH LINK TO VIOLENT CRIME

IN COURT: HOW MODERN-DAY SCOURGE HURTS US ALL

GALLERY: FACES OF METH ADDICTS

Originally published as Nation’s ice scourge out of control