HS analysis The giant police operation revolutionized the drug situation in Finland: the use of the most common hard drug collapsed, but who is now taking over the criminal market?

Finland there has been an unprecedented change in the drug situation that has not made headlines.

The use of Finland’s most common hard drug, amphetamine, collapsed last year, according to recent results from the National Institute for Health and Welfare’s (THL) wastewater survey.

The results show much more than the prevalence of use of a single drug.

The collapse in amphetamine use is also an indication that law enforcement authorities can, if successful, have a significant effect on the drug situation in Finland, at least momentarily. No clear example of this has been seen in Finland before.

At the same time, drug users and drug leagues are in a new situation.

Now, at least temporary changes are likely to take place in which substances are used in Finland and which criminal groups bring them for purchase by street-level users.

Amphetamine use became widespread in Finland for many years, until last year there was a turnaround.

Over the past year, THL measured the prevalence of certain drug use in wastewater in four major cities. Amphetamine use collapsed in all four cities, namely Helsinki, Espoo, Turku and Tampere.

In Helsinki, Espoo and Turku, amphetamine use decreased by about 60 per cent in the November survey compared to the March survey. In Tampere, too, consumption fell by about half the amount of spring.

No such sharp decline in amphetamine use has ever occurred in a ten-year measurement history.

Mixed Experts from THL and the police believe the decline in amphetamine use is very likely due to the international operation Greenlight.

In it, the FBI of the U.S. Central Criminal Police managed to expose its own secret phones to the underworld.

Thanks to it, an exceptionally large number of actors suspected of serious drug offenses were caught in Finland last year and another. Greenlight is Finland’s largest-ever government drug operation.

Read more: FBI conspiracy leads Finnish police to EUR 100 million drug case – according to HS, an Estonian man born in the 1960s has played a key role

Operation the exceptionality can be illustrated as follows.

For the purpose of this paper, THL calculated an estimate of the amount of amphetamine used in Finland in record year 2020 based on wastewater surveys.

Those caught in the Greenlight operation are suspected of smuggling about 890 kilos of amphetamine to Finland between summer 2020 and summer 2021. According to police, it was about 80-90% clean.

Roughly speaking, those caught in Greenlight operations are therefore suspected of having provided the same amount of amphetamine to Finland during the one-year period, when the substance was used throughout the country during the record year 2020.

Even if a small percentage of the charges were dropped in future lawsuits, it would still be a huge success for law enforcement.

The results of the Greenlight operation are particularly evident in amphetamine use, but other substances were also smuggled and distributed by the same criminal groups.

Cocaine use also fluctuated exceptionally much in the Helsinki area last year. According to THL, this may be due to “market disruptions” in the delivery of the substance to users caused by the Greenlight operation.

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Drug users and drug leagues are in a new situation.

Essential The question is whether the Greenlight operation has reduced drug use in Finland or whether the use has shifted from amphetamine to other substances, for example.

There are signs of both options.

Head of THL’s Forensic Chemistry Unit Teemu Gunnarin there are strong indications that drug use declined last year. Before last year, use had increased for years, according to experts.

First, wastewater studies did not show a significant increase in the use of any other substance as amphetamine use decreased. Studies measure the use of some of the most common drugs except cannabis, but not all substances.

Drunk driving into the police also began to decline last spring. Before that, drug addiction had become more common for a long time.

The turnaround in the number of drug addicts occurred at the same time in the spring, when amphetamine use began to decline based on near real-time wastewater monitoring in the Helsinki area.

Also drug users have found that amphetamine is not sold on the street as before.

“There has been less amphetamine available and it has been of lower quality than before. Active users have reported being replaced by modified drugs such as alpha-pvp and gel-like varnish (gamma-butyrolactone). Rivatril tablets, among other things, are also used, ”says the Blue Ribbon Foundation’s peer review expert Juha-Pekka Pääskysaari.

Wastewater surveys have shown a small increase in the use of alpha-pvp and alpha-php and methamphetamine mentioned by Pääskysaari. However, according to THL, the increase is small compared to the significant decrease in amphetamine use.

In addition to other illicit drugs, the use of amphetamines is also partly being replaced by legal intoxicants and drugs prescribed by doctors, says the Southeast Finland Police Crime Commissioner Lari Rönkä.

Rönkä has been the director of research in the Greenlight drug investigation in south-eastern Finland and has been monitoring the development of the drug situation for a long time, for example from wastewater research.

Second the essential question is what is happening in the drug market now.

The drug situation has not yet returned to normal. In the Helsinki area, amphetamine use has also been lower than before in the most recent measurements made at the beginning of this year.

It may be easier than before for potential new players in the underworld to take their share of the Finnish drug market once the authorities have succeeded in suspending some key criminal groups.

There is still demand for amphetamines and other drugs.

“When a vacuum emerges in the drug market, it also fills up. It remains to be seen how quickly it will happen and who will fill the vacuum. It is not possible to say in advance from which direction the new players will come, ”says Rönkä.