President Calderón will deliver his annual address on the state of Mexico today - a state that millions of Mexicans now see as terrifying. Murders, shootings, kidnappings and gang violence have turned the country's main cities into battlegrounds. Almost every day policemen are killed in ever more brazen attacks. Hundreds of people have been kidnapped, and dozens have been murdered, sometimes even after a ransom was paid. In one case last week 12 decapitated bodies were found in Yucatán. In hopes of avoiding a similar fate, some who can afford it are even paying for implanted microchips to enable rescuers to track them if kidnapped.

Drugs are the cancer that is destroying lives, the law and the nation's political fabric. Mexico has now surpassed Colombia as the main drug production and distribution centre for the western hemisphere. Methamphetamines, cocaine, marijuana, heroin and crystal meth are smuggled into American in huge quantities, with an estimated 550-700 tonnes crossing into the US each year. Heroin production last year went up by 56 per cent. In November soldiers seized 23.5 tonnes of cocaine, the largest haul yet reported and enough for about 200 million lines. The cartels controlling this trade earn an estimated $30billion a year, and drugs now account for about 4 per cent of Mexico's turnover.

The corrosive effects cannot be overstated. Gang wars have become so vicious that people are inured to the violence. When victims' heads are dumped in coolboxes and torture videos posted on YouTube, when a drug gang casually rolls five severed heads across a nightclub floor and journalists reporting the atrocities are shot, suffocated or burnt to death, the result is a deep sense of helplessness. The police seem powerless - or unwilling - to act, since many themselves are instigating the violence or carrying out kidnappings on behalf of gangs that have suborned them. And those that resist meet spectacular deaths: in May Mexico's acting chief of police was shot nine times as he arrived home - his killers sent by another federal officer. In all, 2,700 people have been killed this year in drug-related violence, a rise of 50 per cent in a year. Barely 5 per cent of crimes are solved.

As the middle classes cower in barricaded homes, President Calderón has had to resort to military measures. More than 36,000 troops have been deployed across the country. A new law is to allow drug suspects to be held for up to 80 days without charge. Police can enter homes without a warrant in hot pursuit. The criminal justice system has been overhauled. These measures and arrests of syndicate bosses have had some effect - largely exacerbating the violence.

Mexico's crisis has spread north with the violence and drugs. The Bush Administration has responded by offering an emergency $500 million package of equipment and training, but the programmed is stalled in Congress. No one doubts President Calderón's commitment. But he is handicapped by a political culture that has too long tolerated corruption, too often planned only for the short term and still reacts with kneejerk hostility to US initiatives. His speech must spell out long-term reforms, especially of the police. It is not new laws that are needed, however, but a commitment from an entire nation to rid itself of the scourge now tearing it apart.