If their parents make meth, the children live amid toxic chemicals. If their parents are arrested, the children often end up living with strangers. If a drug is involved in the death of a child, experts say it is by far most likely to be meth. The meth industry has manufactured thousands of gallons of toxic wastes that are dumped into rivers and irrigation canals and onto some of the nation's richest farmland. But not all manufacturing is done at locations populated by crops or cows.
Labs show up in warehouses, suburban neighborhoods, hotel rooms and even the trunks of cars.
Meth is California's unpaid bill. It comes due in hospitals and schools, jails and courtrooms, neighborhoods and farm fields. And you pay it. Maybe it's through higher taxes or higher insurance rates. Maybe it's less direct, like waiting longer for a cop to show up to your emergency because he is tied up at a meth bust, or having your child's school lessons slowed down because of problems with the kids whose parents are addicts, or having your plumbing repaired twice because the guy who did it the first time had a head full of meth and messed it up.