Methamphetamine use increasing

Public health officials voice concerns about infants born to addicted mothers.

By Victoria Stagg Elliott, AMNews staff. July 26, 2004.

When obstetrician-gynecologist Mary F. Holley, MD, left Houston 15 years ago for Guntersville, Ala., she was relieved. No more would she have to deal with cocaine-addicted babies, common in that urban area but rare in her new rural locale.

But this peace did not last.

America's growing methamphetamine crisis hit her area about five years ago. She now estimates that 10% of her patients are addicted to the stimulant. They come to her for help with the depression that is so commonly associated with the drug's use. Sometimes, they are so twitchy that drawing blood is difficult. And she is particularly concerned when a patient is pregnant because the drug is associated with a litany of problems for children.

"We're seeing devastation," she said. "Infant mortality is high. The kids who are born won't feed. They're underweight. They're sick. They are going to have ADHD almost guaranteed, and they grow up in a home with an addicted mother who doesn't care about them."

Dr. Holley, the founder of Mothers against Methamphetamine, and other physicians are seeing the impact of this drug's increasing popularity, particularly in rural areas.

Methamphetamine was initially only available by prescription and was commonly prescribed for weight loss in the 1950s and 1960s. In the 1980s, illegal meth labs started appearing in California, and the drug has been traveling eastward ever since -- arriving with considerable impact in small towns, which had previously been spared the problems experienced in urban areas.