Blue meth in Prague

Did you know that 5% of the 10m Czech population uses crystal meth, known locally as pervitin? Of course you didn't, because it's nonsense. But millions of people who saw Sunday's episode of "Breaking Bad" in the U.S. and other countries now know it. The show depicted the CR as a large, highly active market for methamphetamine, a market that is supposedly twice as profitable as the Southwest U.S. area dealt with in the award- winning TV show. It's true that the CR supplies an estimated 95% of Europe's crystal meth, but the actual number of Czechs using the drug in 2011 was only 28,200, according to the European Monitoring Center for Drugs and Drug Addiction. The show's writer, Moira Walley-Beckett, apparently confused meth production in the country (which is largely exported) with local meth usage. Or maybe she visited Wenceslas Square on a Friday night and extrapolated from there.