Kanawha County is the epicenter of West Virginia meth, reports the Charleston Gazette. The county, which includes the capital city of Charleston and has the state’s largest population (about 200,000), has reported eight times as many methamphetamine lab seizures as any other county in West Virginia so far this year, according to the State Police. Kanawha has had 113 meth lab busts. Cabell County was the next highest with 14.
Kanawha County’s meth lab busts are on pace to surpass 300 for the year — more than the 288 labs seized by law enforcement across the entire state in 2012. An increasing number of individuals there are making meth in small “shake and bake” or “one-pot” mobile labs, said Mike Goff, a state pharmacy board administrator who has studied the issue for years. “There are just so many people cooking it,” Goff said Tuesday. “It spreads like wildfire.”