Anti-crystal meth campaign launches in northern Mexico

“I don’t know how many men raped me, but they raped me. When I got up I didn’t have my clothes on. I started bleeding from my nose. I lived two months on the street; I slept in cars. Cold, hunger -– I suffered everything.

“There were days when I didn’t have the drugs, and these days I was desperate -– to do drugs for sex, to do ... anything.''

Patricia -– her full name is unknown -– is a former crystal meth addict. Testimony like her's is featured in "La Obscuridad de Cristal, Sonora" ("Crystal Darkness in Sonora"), a documentary scheduled to air Wednesday across the Mexican state of Sonora. The initiative is backed by the local government and the U.S nonprofit group ChildHelp, which has already run similar campaigns in the United States and one in Mexico's Ciudad Juarez.

The documentary is being promoted by a billboard campaign in Sonora, and trailers running on YouTube feature extracts of interviews with former crystal meth users, aiming to generate interest in the program that will air on 72 television stations, 130 cable TV outlets and 90 radio stations throughout the state.

Crystal meth -- methamphetamine -- is a growing problem in northern Mexico, which is also one of the states heavily affected by the country's increasingly violent and deadly drug war.

While the national government tackles the country's powerful drug lords using the army and federal police, this campaign from local Sonora authorities suggests they are attempting to tackle the problem at the demand, as well as the supply, end.

Sonora's health secretary -- Raymund López Vucovich -- claims that drug consumption in the state is the No. 1 public health concern, especially the growing consumption of crystal meth. Use of the drug grew by more than 300% between 2002 and 2007, according to the state's health department. Of the 2,272 patients treated in Sonora for addiction in 2007, 38.4% were crystal meth consumers.

Go here to watch the Spanish-language trailers for the campaign on YouTube.

The "Crystal Darkness" program has previously aired in San Diego, Sacramento, Las Vegas, Reno, El Paso, Oregon; New Mexico; Arizona and Ciudad Juarez, Mexico. Campaigns are underway in Oklahoma, Colorado, Arkansas, Washington and Central California -- you can see the English-language website here.

-- Deborah Bonello in Mexico City

Image: These images are taken from the "Crystal Darkness" campaign, and picture an unnamed woman before and 3 1/2 years after she started using crystal meth.

Comments

[Southoc]

I guess we can once again thank Mexico for their illegal gifts.