Some slightly alarming figures on drug use have recently come out of Shanghai in China suggesting a massive increase in the use of drugs and drug related crime… well kind of.

According to the Shanghai Daily, there was a 61% annual increase in trafficking cases involving over 1 kg of drugs with 55 cases solved.

There was a tripling of the number of foerigners being caught with drugs in Shanghai with 33 gwailos found with drugs last year.

In 2005, over 8% of criminal cases were drug related.

Now the figures are interesting for a few reasons. For starters, they were released by the Shanghai Anti-Drug Office. Considering the concept of face saving in China, the admission of any perceived failure is quite significant. The specific significance however, might be a little more complicated to grasp.

In this case, it is possible that the agency concerned with drug reduction in the city is growning concerned with the problem, or there may be another slighly more selfish reason for the release of these figures. By exposing these figures publicly, their superiors will be forced to act with funding and support.

While the figures do show a marked increase in specific crimes, the overall absolute numbers are still quite low.

Perhaps the Shanghai Anti-Drug Office is practicing the manipulation of media as part of its political game.