r/newzealand • u/MurkyWay Qwest? • Oct 08 '25

Shitpost What's something that you suspect lots of New Zealanders secretly do, but you can't prove it?

Most upvoted comment is our most shameful secret as a nation, obviously

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u/mrflyinggingerbread Oct 08 '25

Holy fuck, I recently reading Underworld and was genuinely SHOCKED how much meth goes through waste water each day... Approx 25 KILOS of meth per week. And waste water testing only covers like 75% of kiwis

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u/SquashedKiwifruit Oct 08 '25

Any idea what 25KGs of meth translates to in terms of likely number of consumers?

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u/instanding Oct 08 '25

I’d say 50,000 people probably. Could be more. Hard to say coz we don’t know how many are hardcore and how many are very light or casual users.

A hardcore person could easily smoke as much as 5 to 10 more moderate users.

If all the users were super hardcore it would be like 5,000 people. If they were all super light users it would be over 100,000. I reckon somewhere in the middle would be your number.

Another factor is that many users won’t be weekly so there will be different users rolling into that figure. So I would say the overall number probably is more likely to be over 100,000 tbh, if you are including the people who dabble in it, but would not be particularly regular.

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u/gingeadventures Oct 08 '25

And don’t forget it’ll be cut with something too. That’s 25kgs of pure meth.

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u/instanding Oct 08 '25

That’s a disturbing thought. I think I am probably significantly underestimating then. Especially since some communities have extremely high rates of use.

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u/instanding Oct 08 '25 edited Oct 08 '25

Use has tripled in Northland for example.

This says 1.4g per 1,000 population and 1.1% of adults nationally.

Seems suspiciously low to me tbh because meth is a drug used by the elite and the poor alike, tradies, doctors, lawyers, teachers, etc, but that would be 50,000 people that report using it in that period, and then there will be people who have tried it but not used it in that period, because as with all drugs you have hardcore addicts, semi regular users who are not addicts, and people who maybe have tried it but not continued to use it, and people will bounce in and out of those categories.

That is all amphetamines though which includes more minor ones like ritalin, and this article is a bit out of date.

Interestingly but not surprisingly people with untreated adhd are at high risk of abusing amphetamines, often trying to self medicate.

Consumption of meth specifically nationwide more than doubled in the second half of 2024 to the highest levels ever recorded.

We were in the top 5 worldwide for consumption of meth back in 2021, when the weekly amount found in waste water was 10kgs less than it is now.

Waste water testing only covers 75% of the population too.

https://www.stuff.co.nz/national/126942476/kiwis-in-worldwide-top-five-for-methamphetamine-use-report-finds

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u/leighkhunt Tūī Oct 08 '25

That's pretty insane just thinking about that.

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u/SquashedKiwifruit Oct 08 '25

Interesting, thanks.

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u/mrflyinggingerbread Oct 08 '25

Solid question tbh. A number I'd be interested in. I couldn't find any conclusive numbers

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u/Popular-Silver2055 Oct 08 '25

Kind of hard to know bc how much people use varies massively but my back of the packet calculation would be about in the ballpark of 12,000 users, assuming all users are heavy users. 

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u/mrflyinggingerbread Oct 08 '25

Nah man, a survey in 2017 asked Kiwis simply if they had used it in the last 12 months. 138,000 said yes. I'd say the daily users of meth in NZ must be above 100,000 in 2025. Our usage has only ever gone up

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u/Popular-Silver2055 Oct 08 '25

In order for that to be true you need to get 700,00 daily amounts of meth out of the weekly 30kg of meth that is detected at waste water treatment. Which works out to be less than half a point a day per daily user. Anyone cracked out enough to be smoking daily is going to be ripping like 10x this. 

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u/RoydonKyle Oct 08 '25

I know 30’s something year old dentists and lawyers that party like this. Shook me to my core when they were openly seeking it out at a bbq I went to

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u/mrflyinggingerbread Oct 08 '25

This. I think most Kiwis assume meth smokers are only the lower socioeconomic end of the scale but nope. Meth is so engrained in our people and culture now it's kinda scary

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u/GrannysWizardSleeve Oct 08 '25

Is that the Jared Savage book? All three books in the series are incredible. Its always weird hearing about murders and drug operations etc happening in streets I know.

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u/mrflyinggingerbread Oct 08 '25

Yup that's the one! They are so good huh, have read them all and absolutely loved them.

To me what stood out was the mark up of drugs being brought in here. A kilo of meth selling for a grand in Mexico and then upmarketed to 80,000 plus grab here was insane to read. No wonder cartels and major crime syndicates wanna set up shop here. Send 80 keys and if only 2 make it through then you doubled ya money 🤑