Deadly sex party drug exploding in UK city fuelling fears of addiction crisis
A deadly drug that can lead to long-term mental health issues and heart problems has been exploding in Manchester and experts fear the current addiction crisis will get even worse.
Crystal meth use is on the rise in the city since the coronavirus pandemic, a study by researchers at Manchester Metropolitan University and Greater Manchester Combined Authority has found.
The price of the drug has also dropped - with a gram now costing around £40-60, down from around £100-120 two to three years ago.
The deadly drug - known as 'Tina' or 'T' - has now largely replaced mephedrone as a drug of choice in Manchester's gay chemsex scene, reports the Manchester Evening News.
A batch of crystal meth tested by researchers for the 2022 GM Trends drugs report (Greater Manchester Combined Authority)Several users interviewed for the GM Trends study said its use was widespread. "From personal experience, being involved in that scene in Manchester, I can certainly say that in the last 12-18 months, there’s been an explosion of use of crystal meth around Manchester," one told the researchers.
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"Two to three years ago, there's probably only two to three people supplying it in the area. I currently have on my phone, 23 crystal meth dealers in Manchester.
"It's unheard of. There's probably more, springing up all over the place. Each one is like, not regularly, but when I've bought stuff from other places, each one is saying how busy they are.
"A lot of them have moved into it from other stuff because the other stuff [mephedrone] isn't being bought anymore."
Another user said: "It's becoming more normalised because more people are doing it, very quickly. Crystal meth used to be - if you Googled 'crystal meth' you saw a photo of some woman, spots all over the place.
"I would be horrified to have taken that, looking back. But everything now is just ‘Tina, Tina, Tina!'"
While researchers found meth was being used across Greater Manchester, several people said it was common to see it being smoked openly in the Gay Village.
"You go to the village now and it's everywhere," one user interviewed for the study said. "You go in the toilets in the bars and people are just openly smoking it, big puffs of smoke, Tina everywhere, it's so blatant now, they just don't care!"
There are several different types of meth being sold around Manchester, often referred to by the country in which it's supposedly made. 'English T' tends to be the cheapest and is widely thought to be the lowest quality, whereas 'Hong Kong T' and German T' are more expensive and considered purer.
There is also 'Pink Champagne' - a pink form of the drug which is among the most expensive on sale. Users often take meth alongside the depressants GHB and GBL - a combo known as a 'T and G' or 'G and T' - to help them come down.
Dealers are also said to be doing 'sex party' packages where the two substances are sold alongside prescription drugs such as Viagra and Zopiclone.
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"If you go on Grindr, it’s 'H n H', high and horny. 'T & G'. People advertising on there to come round and have chemsex parties," another user told researchers. "And that’s more and more common.
"You look on there and every weekend, every night. People advertising on there that they've got drugs, 'Come round, let's have fun'.
"In my opinion it's getting worse. There's people that are taking it [crystal meth] that I never would have thought would have."
The deadly risks of mixing meth and GHB were highlighted in 2020 when a case at Manchester Crown Court heard that chef Hiran Chauhan, 24, died at a flat in Salford after having chemsex with Tesco worker Neil Cuckson.
Chef Hiran Chauhan's body was dumped in woodland near his flat (PA)
Neil Cuckson has been jailed for six years (MEN MEDIA)The pair had met on Grindr and got an Uber to Cuckson's flat in Salford. Cuckson injected Hiran with crystal meth and GHB.
Tragically Cuckson woke up the following morning to find Hiran dead. He then frantically tried to cover up Hiran's death, storing his body in his third floor flat for days while continuing to go to work.
He then buried Hiran in a park opposite his flat. The body was found by schoolchildren almost a week later wrapped in bedding and plastic sheets.
Cuckson was jailed for six years after pleading guilty to administering a poison or noxious substance so as to endanger life, perverting the course of justice, preventing a lawful burial, supplying class A drug crystal meth, supplying class C drug GBH.
Drugs expert Prof Rob Ralphs, one of the report's authors, said despite a series of false alarms over the last 10-15 years meth has never really gained a foothold in the UK. But he fears that could be about to change.
"We've been talking about crystal meth since the 90s, saying it was going to be the next big thing, the new crack, that it will be used by that same population, but it never happened," he said. "We had Breaking Bad and it still didn't happen.
"But what's different this time is that it's being made on a large scale in the Netherlands, the Mexican cartels are involved, Afghanistan is involved. All the big players in the drugs trafficking market are there."
And Prof Ralphs says that's also coincided with a change in attitudes towards the drug in the gay chemsex scene. "It's not emerged in the expected population, it's mainly men who have sex with men that are using it," he said.
"What came up a lot in the research is that a couple of years ago a lot of people were saying they would never touch it. People were really negative about it, it was highly stigmatised.
"Fast forward a couple of years and those same people who were so negative about it are using it. What we've also seen recently is the price has come down from as high as £120 a gram to as cheap as £40 a gram.
"The result of the drop in price is that it used to be middle-aged, affluent professionals, now more teenagers and people in their 20s are using it because it's cheaper, its affordable. Quite often you see new drugs emerge in the LGBT community, then find their way into the clubs and then move into a wider demographic.
"Ecstasy and ketamine are two good examples of that in recent decades. So it is really important that we monitor this drug for signs of it being used beyond the chemsex scene in Manchester."
The report says there is a 'low level' of awareness of the risk of regular use of chemsex drugs and says there is an 'urgent need to educate people about harm reduction approaches'. It makes several recommendations, including raising awareness of the drugs and their effects among emergency services, health workers and mental health workers.
A public health campaign to highlight the risks of both crystal meth and GHB is also proposed.
Crystal meth is common in the US but use in the UK is ever increasing. It is usually smoked in glass pipes in a similar way to crack cocaine.
It can be injected either dry or dissolved in water and some people snort or swallow it, explains the Surrey and Borders Partnership.
The drug is highly addictive and some effects people experience include euphoria, increased energy, alertness, happiness and increased sex drive. These effects can last as long as 12 hours.
Among the risks of taking methamphetamines there are excessive sweating, loss of appetite, insomnia, violence, agitation, panic, irritability, confusion and increased blood pressure.
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