Enviro Clean technician Zeb Waters cleans up meth-contaminated houses. Photo by John Borren
The Bay of Plenty Times this week carried the story of little Alicia Steenson, who has been diagnosed with a rare form of leukaemia that her parents believe was caused by methamphetamine contamination in their rented home.
Julia Proverbs looks at the growing problem and how it is being addressed.
Wanting to buy a house, you are leafing through the property guide when the perfect place catches your eye.
Tucked away in a quiet suburban street, with a fully fenced yard and within walking distance of the local school, the cosy three-bedroom home ticks all the boxes for you and your young family.
You view the property and it lives up to expectations. Inside, the house is fresh and clean, having had a new lick of paint.
Even the price is right. But looks can be deceiving.
Beneath its shiny exterior could be lurking a cocktail of chemicals, lying in wait to slowly leach out over time, destroying the health of you and your loved ones.
This unsuspecting suburban dream could soon become a nightmare.
Methamphetamine, or P, does not discriminate. Those who use it come from a wide range of backgrounds.
With studies suggesting that more than 20 per cent of long-term users attempt to make it at some point, it follows that the houses in which it is manufactured are also varied.
"It could be your next door neighbour,'' says Errol Brain, general manager of the New
Zealand Drug Detection Agency, Bay of Plenty and Rotorua.
Brain joined the agency just three-and-a-half months ago and is shocked by what he has seen.
"These are typical Kiwi homes. Some are nicer properties, some aren't. It's not just targeted at low-value homes. It does not discriminate. There's a real cross-section, lots of different values in houses. There's no real trend there,'' he says.
For commercial reasons, the agency will not disclose the number of tests it carries out, but says that number is growing.
"The numbers we do are definitely increasing three-to-five-fold year on year,'' says Brain.
So far this year, it has already tested more properties than it did for the whole of 2005; the year it was established.
Since mid-2010, 17 per cent of properties tested by the agency have had a positive result.
That percentage is dropping, but only because more people are getting tests done, says Brain.
"In the early days, there were not many properties being tested so people were testing almost definitely knowing they had a P house. Now we're testing more but the percentage is lower because people are being more proactive.''
More house buyers are requesting tests as a condition of sale, he adds.
The $430 test (excluding GST) indicates whether there is methamphetamine contamination that exceeds Ministry of Health Guidelines of 0.5 micrograms per 100 square centimetres of surface.
A cheaper and more basic test is offered by MethSolutions, which provides a yes/no answer, but does not show the degree of contamination.
If the test, which costs $99 (plus GST), comes back positive, further testing is required to ascertain the extent of the problem.
In some cases, contamination is minimal, caused by someone smoking methamphetamine in a house. In others, it is much higher, due to manufacturing.
MethSolutions tested 49 houses in the Bay of Plenty for methamphetamine last year, of which 53 per cent were contaminated. The level of contamination in five of them suggested the drug may have been manufactured in them.
Director Miles Stratford says the test kit was developed for use primarily by those involved in the property industry.
"The aim was to create a network of people who have the skills and understanding to give a basic service,'' says Stratford.
MethSolutions now has 20 certified samplers in the Tauranga area, most of whom are involved in real estate.
"Most of the time it's people looking to buy property. At the moment, most who own investment properties don't want to know and no one is putting pressure on them to do so.''
The company also runs an on-going monitoring system, MethMinder, which sends an alert
wirelessly via the national digital cell network if methamphetamine is detected in a property.
The system, which costs about $10 a week, acts as a safeguard for property owners and tenants alike, and a deterrent for criminal activity.
"Dodgy people will go elsewhere,'' says Stratford.
The cost is minimal compared with the cost of having to decontaminate a house, he says.
Forensic and Industrial Science provides more detailed testing - $3500 to $4000, to determine the extent of contamination.
"More and more there is a greater awareness of the methamphetamine contamination problem and more and more people are coming to us because a quick presumptive test states that methamphetamine is present but it doesn't show how much,'' says Dr Nick Powell.
"We're really using methamphetamine as a proxy for everything else present. It requires very careful searching for indicator compounds ... by-products during manufacture and interpreting correctly. You need to be more than just an analyst. You have to be very good at understanding drug chemistry.''
The process takes up to a week and includes a complete environmental assessment and recommendations for remediation.
Decontaminating a house can range from washing down the walls to complete demolition.
Jeremy Hooper, operations manager of Enviro Clean and Restoration, at Mount Maunganui, says it can be an emotional and stressful time for home owners.
"We had one guy in his 80s - he was in tears. He grew up in the house. We had to strip it out. It just wasn't the same ... the whole thought of that going on in his childhood home,'' says Hooper.
In other cases, tenants had to move out, due to contamination by previous tenants, some suffering from associated health problems.
The franchise has decontaminated 25 houses in the past eight years.
The least expensive clean-up the company did was $500 to water blast a garage, and the most expensive was about $50,000, to gut a house where there had been an explosion.
The average cost sits at around $12,000 to $13,000.
"That's just for clean-up, not replacing,'' says Hooper.
"Normally it's pretty near a water source - kitchen, bathroom, laundry - but that's not always the case. If it's a rented property, it can be harder to hide. It might be one of the bedrooms, the garage, a wardrobe. It [the spread] depends on the extent of the cooking. It could be the whole house or it could be one room.''
Hopper says much of the work involves removing, stripping and sanding surfaces.
Then an emulsifier imported from the United States is used for cleaning.
Technicians wear overalls and breathing apparatus, packaging contaminated materials in sealed plastic bags, for burial.
"It's a slow process. They need to take breaks regularly, especially in the summer. Sometimes you need more than one test. Sometimes you open a can of worms. Some are a lot more extensive than everyone first thought,'' says Hooper.
Dealing with an "invisible'' enemy, they rely on test results to guide them.
"A lot of the time it doesn't look like there is anything wrong. In the early days, there were some telltale signs _ staining on bench surfaces, a lot of corrosion in the sink, yellowing on the ceiling ... but not so much now. They are getting better with cooking ability and everything. Some even paint over it.''
Hooper says he would like to see legislation introduced that deals specifically with the contamination of houses by methamphetamine.
"There are no laws governing. You don't have to offer your results to police or council. We'd like law, like for asbestos.''
The Ministry of Business, Innovation and Employment says landlords are not legally obliged to tell a prospective tenant if a property has been contaminated by methamphetamine, unless they are asked by them.
They could, however, be in breach of the Residential Tenancies and the Health acts if cleaning is not up to the required standard, says a spokesman.
"If the police have been involved in respect of a meth lab, it will generally be noted on the LIM report for the property.''
Tauranga City Council says it does not keep a record of how many properties have had LIM reports issued with a notation regarding methamphetamine contamination.
However, during the past five years, the council has received notifications from police in relation to eight properties.
"When council receives a notification from the police that hazardous chemicals and/or contaminated equipment believed to be used in the manufacture of prohibited drugs (P) have been found at a property, that information is placed on the property file,'' says a spokesman.
"The council writes to the owner and requests that they undertake testing (to determine the level of contamination) and any remedial work required to decontaminate the property. The police notification and the subsequent record of actions (including test and decontamination results) is kept on the public property file and will be recorded in any LIM report relating to that property.''
Helen O'Sullivan, chief executive of the Real Estate Institute of New Zealand, says there is an increasing awareness of the potential for an issue.
"Five years ago, it was a social issue. Now it's become a property issue,'' she says.
"Five years ago, we were telling agents what to do to spot the signs, to be alert, to notice. Eighteen months ago, we extended to real estate agents what processes you should be able to put your hands on if you need to.''
Why is a meth-contaminated property bad for your health?
Some of the chemicals used to manufacture meth, the gases that penetrate the fabric of a building and the chemicals that are poured down drains and into gardens are highly toxic.
The cooking process itself produces new organic chemicals (those typically associated with cancer) that are poorly understood by scientists. The long-term effect of these chemicals will only be known once the people exposed to them start to evidence unusual health effects.
Short-term, acute health effects can be asthma-like symptoms, breathing difficulties, skin rashes, eye irritations, head-aches and nausea. As some people are more sensitive than others, one member of a family may be entirely unaffected while another suffers horrendous skin rashes.
Long-term health effects can include chronic fatigue, diseases of the central nervous system, circulatory system, strokes and cancer.
- Home Owners and Buyers Association New Zealand
Signs from outside a property
Chemical odours, coming from the building, rubbish or detached buildings. The overriding odours will be those of solvents such as paint thinners and nail polish remover.
Exhaust fans running for a long period and at odd times.
Frequent visitors to the address at odd hours.
Windows blackened out or curtains always drawn.
People coming outside only to smoke.
Occupants unfriendly, appearing secretive about their activities, exhibiting paranoid or odd behaviour.
Expensive security and surveillance gear set up around the property.
Access denied to landlords, neighbours and other visitors.
Rent paid in cash.
Rubbish containing a large amount of cold and flu packaging, chemical type containers, bottles and boxes with labels removed.
Signs when inside a property
Laboratory glassware, equipment and documents.
Containers with clear liquids in them with a chalky coloured solid on the bottom or similar.
Containers with two layered liquids in them, usually one dark coloured layer and one clear or pale yellow layer.
Used coffee filters containing either a white pasty or reddish brown substance.
Baking dishes or similar containing white crystalline powder or substance.
The presence of hot plates near chemicals.
Chemical odours coming out of rooms.
Yellowish brown staining on the walls or ceiling.
- New Zealand Drug Detection Agency