Source: The Blade, Toledo, Ohio Contact: Sunday, June 29, 1997 Drug help for adults called top priority Lost productivity, violence cited during workshop By Jane Schmucker, Blade Staff Writer Most drug users are adults with jobs and families, but almost all programs aimed at curbing drug abuse are for schoolchildren. That's a big reason why the country is losing the war on drugs, Milton Creagh said. Speaking yesterday at a parent workshop on drug problems, Mr. Creagh said drugs increase domestic violence and decrease productivity on the job, yet the public outcry is to educate children about drugs. "At what point are we going to say, 'Stop the adults!'" Mr. creagh, a motivational speaker from Stone Mountain, Ga., asked the group in the University of Toledo's student union. He said 10 per cent of the work force has a substance abuse problem and half of all worker's compensation claims are related to substance abuse. A substance abuser is 2.5 times more likely than other workers to be absent more than eight days a year and is onethird less productive, at an average cost of $9,660 a year to employers, according to federal government statistics he quoted. To Mr. Creagh, preemployment drug screenings aren't nearly enough. "They catch the fullblown junkies who cannot stop and stupid people who cannot count," he said, adding that most recreational drug users know how many days after drug use a urine sample will appear clean. Programs from Drug Abuse Resistance Education to Prom Promise are aimed at youth because schools provide speakers with a captive audience that is harder to find among adults, Mr. Creagh said. Indeed, yesterday there were 1,000 chairs set up for the program sponsored by the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration and the University of Toledo Police Department, but only 40 were filled. "I was hoping to fill this place, but we have the diehards and they'll get the message out," said Charles Moffitt, agentincharge of the Toledo office of the U.S. Drug Enforcement Agency. Adults tend to be a captive audience only at Sunday morning church services, at work, or in jail, Mr. Creagh said. He believes that if ministers and employers would do more to encourage adults to shun all mind altering drugs, that more kids would stay clean too. Many children are introduced to drugs by adults who believe that they are save, he said. "If you honesttoGod want to help the kids, then by God, you need to help the adults too," Mr. Creagh said.