A SHIFT IN ALL MARKETS

“Check out that Vape, bro.” Rooster said as he pointed to a glowing gizmo under his TV. I reach over to grab a heavy, vape-looking thing. It was top quality, had a built-in screen with a bunch of numbers and readings. Was this a vape or a gadget some see as the death of the meteorology industry?

“That was left here by a bikie mate of mine,” Rooster chuckled. “I thought that’d be a good Segway into our chat.” 

COVID-19 has torn through any business’s idea of normal. Spun around a few times and then pulled up a chair and asked for a drink. 

While we’ve been hearing about how restaurants, shopping centres, service industries and other non-essential, legitimate businesses have been struggling and often in the face of adversity, adjusting. It got me thinking, how did all of the illegitimate businesses fare during lockdown? Namely, the narcotics trade. 

Back to Rooster and the Bikie’s vape. Rooster would call himself a “plug” which is someone who helps link up dealers with suppliers and vice versa, while dabbling in some casual dealing. He’s a man who knows people. Weirdly, this seems to be down to a similar curiosity, as to the one I have in writing this article. From what I could grasp Rooster deals mainly in marijuana. 

In a way I would have imagined lockdown would have been good for the narcotics trade. Especially for those peddling cannabis, the idea of a lockdown is what would seem to a ‘stoners’ dream. However, this wasn’t exactly the case as Rooster went on to explain.

A large majority of drugs that come into South East Queensland come through the border from NSW.  For some specific drugs like Meth, MDMA and Cocaine, their point of entry is through international shipping routes, but for most serious amounts of narcotics, namely cannabis. They seep northward from our southern neighbour. Why is this?

Well, Melbourne and Sydney are our most populace cities. In a business sense it’s a lot smarter to base your production as close to your market as possible. Therefore, most drugs are manufactured in NSW. From there Brisbane, the Gold Coast and the rest of SEQ will then usually get their supply from the same areas of growth and manufacture that also supply Melbourne and Sydney. Which, pre-Covid worked fairly well. Gangs held power over entry points along the border, the flow of goods moved northward to Rooster and those of his ilk to peddle narcotics off to the vagabonds, vagrants and all the other wonderous lowlifes who indulge themselves on the weirder things in life. 

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Like many businesses, the closure of state borders (for the first time in our national history) has led to unprecedented hardship. In this hardship many have floundered, others have adapted. The drug trade is no different. 

Recently QLD and VIC police dismantled a smuggling syndicate, where they seized almost three million dollars’ worth of cannabis. Detective Superintendent Col Briggs from the Drug and Serious Crime Group noted how this group has the capabilities to move hundreds of kilograms worth of marijuana across QLD, WA and VIC.

Some dealers have been switching from weed, which has been declining in quality while becoming more expensive, due to a shortage in product and a closed border. To, as Rooster describes them, “Scrippies.” 

Scrippies are prescription drugs that are sold for recreational use. These include anything from synthetic opioids to benzodiazepine’s (anxiety and depression medication, known on the street as “benzos”). Synthetic opioids began especially, rising to prominence around 2000-2001, according to Roger Nicholas, a researcher from Flinders University, whose work has centred on the recreational use of prescription drugs. At this time the Australian Federal Police shut down three to four major heroin manufacturers which led to what was known as a ‘Heroin Drought.’ This conveniently coincided with the introduction and promotion of opioids painkillers from pharmaceutical companies. Synthetic opioid use has only risen since. 

Roger has also noticed the strain on the narcotics supply, “I can only imagine its increased (use of benzo’s/opioids), there’s a lot of evidence that a range of illicit drugs are becoming quite hard to get like methamphetamine, heroin, probably cocaine as well.”

Drugs used recreationally are generally classed into two categories, uppers and downers. Uppers being your party drugs, MDMA, cocaine, meth etc. and downers being heroin, weed, and scrippies. With a tight supply of traditional downers like weed and heroin, its scrippies where dealers are finding they’re able to get their hands on enough product to stay afloat. 

Rooster also pointed out how logistically, this shift in product has been benefitting dealers. 

“A pound of good bud is still a decent sized brick, even now a pound of shit bud is huge in terms of volume. So logistically you’re always trying to push the highest value for the lowest volume.”

With pills going for $20 each in a bottle of approximately 100 tablets. The shift is proving convenient and profitable for dealers. 

The United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime have noticed a similar trend worldwide in their research into Covid-19’s impact on the drug supply chain. 

“Many countries across all regions have reported an overall shortage of numerous types of drugs at the retail level, as well as increases in prices, reductions in purity and that drug users have consequently been switching substance (for example, from heroin to synthetic opioids”

By Roosters account, this will have a long-lasting effect on the drug trade in SEQ post Covid. With ‘scrippies’ taking the place of other products on offer, it’s not difficult to imagine the outcomes. Abusing prescription drugs is generally associated with a steady decline into addiction. Some prescription medications like Valium and Restavit are often called ‘short-term anti-depressants’ due to their quick acting nature but high potential for abuse. This is commonly known when it comes to widespread recreational use of prescription drugs.

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The US is currently in the middle of a crippling opioid crisis as pharmaceutical companies lobbied for the use of opioid painkillers, while misinforming everyone from medical practitioners to politicians as to the highly addictive nature of the drugs. The US saw deaths from opioid overdoses increase sixfold from 1999-2017 while overdoses from drugs in general tripled in the same period. 

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The lockdowns in Australia has helped consolidate an already rising demand for synthetic opioids and benzodiazepines. Roger’s research for the NCETA (The National Centre for Education and Training on Addiction) has reported that across the board, from overdoses to seizures by police, recreational use of prescription drugs is on the rise. 

Dealers usually get their supply of prescription drugs from numerous ports of supply. The most notorious method of obtaining prescription drugs is the raiding of pharmacies by youth gangs known as ‘eshays’ but while sensational. These raids only make up a small part of the ‘scrippies’ on the illicit market.

In terms of where the vast majority come from, as Rooster puts it “there’s always a dodgy (expletive).”  From doctors to professional manufacturers, dealers pay off people to ‘lose a few cartons’ here and there. Another method is a practice Roger refers to as doctor shopping. When individuals visit a number of doctors describing the same level of pain or discomfort for them to then prescribe them with a desired opioid pain relief. 

But as the demand has grown, people have started to produce their own benzo’s and synthetic opioids to profit off the growing market. In this we are seeing a sharp decline in quality, including the safety of the pills. Rooster claims this is where the real danger lies. Incorrect dosages or unknown added substances could begin to make ‘scrippies’ death traps.

An Editorial in The Drug and Alcohol Review had this to say about how the drug trade may adjust, should traditional supplies of narcotics not recover. “demand may drive shifts towards more easily transported, cheaper and higher-potency substitutes for heroin or other opioids (e.g. fentanyl) or may create incentives for more cutting of drugs with other (potentially dangerous) substances, and these impacts may remain after restrictions are lifted.”

The ultimate risk with this shift away from marijuana and other traditional narcotics, towards ‘scrippies’ is that for many this won’t end up being a temporary switch. Prescription drugs are highly addictive and as we’ve seen, far more accessible. Dealers will undoubtedly begin to start seeing similar profits from a captive market as pharmaceutical companies did in the US, making benzo’s and opioids a much more viable product for dealers to sell. Based on this information we will see more of a cruel, soulless cycle sweep through our workplaces, suburbs and most frighteningly of all, our homes.