There continues to be a lot of talk about fentanyl, and it's behind as many as 100,000 deaths in the country in the last year alone.
However, the federal Drug Enforcement Administration says meth also remains a huge problem across the country.
In the early 2000s, the federal government put several safety mechanisms in place to slow the production of domestic meth labs.
They put drugs like Pseudoephedrine behind the pharmacy counter, and it helped dramatically.
In 2004, there were over 23,000 meth labs seized in the U.S. In 2019, there were an estimated 890 labs seized.
Narrowing down the situation in Michigan, around 328 kilos of meth were seized in 2022, and that's down to 286 kilos in 2023.
While that number is down, public information officer for the administration's Detroit field office said they are seeing a much different form of the drug these days, something much cheaper and more pure.
"We're finding that the price is actually being slashed by some cartels were street dealers are almost getting it for free to establish footholds in new markets," he said. "When you were using ephedrine and other chemicals to make methamphetamine from a massive drugstore purchase in the early 2000s, you weren't making this pure form of methamphetamine."
The DEA said that cartels in Mexico have ramped up productions since domestic meth production has gone down so much, creating the potential for even more deaths.
