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Illegal Drugs By Paul Gahlinger
You've pointed out one of the problems with using statistical methodology to glean information, it frequently doesn't reflect anecdotal experience. That destructive drug abuse (note that the above linked reference does not distinguish between drugs based on legal status) has increased significantly in your hometown doesn't preclude the likeliness that it has dropped in someone else's.
The point is that drug abuse has always existed in human populations. Most of us use them for a while and quit or use them in moderation, but there is and has always been a remarkably consistent minority that don't and either increase their use or continue to use until they become ill and die. Another factor that is so hard to account for, due to the constantly shifting legal status of these substances, is in assigning a value to relative harm caused. There are more than a few rock stars, for example, that have been heroin addicts for decades, but because they have the means to acquire pharmaceutical grade heroin and good medical care, they don't suffer many of the effects we see in the street-level addicts.
Meth is one of today's favorite bogey-men of the prohibitionists. Methamphetamine has been around since the 19th century. We've given it to soldiers, children, fat people, depressed people, etc. for over a century. It is not a good thing for the human body or mind, but the severity of the deleterious effects commonly shown in order to scare people is mainly due to the fact that it's illegal (Trivia: Pot is a schedule 1 drug while meth is schedule 2) necessitates its black market production that includes all manner of impurities and other toxins. IOW, in many cases the shit that's in it because it's illegal is worse than the meth itself.
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