Pubdate: 15 Aug 1999 Source: Wisconsin State Journal (WI) Contact: http://www.madison.com/ Copyright: 1999 THE AMERICAN NEWS SERVICE Author: Mieke H. Bomann Note: Mieke H. Bomann is a staff writer for The American News Service. IS ZERO TOLERANCE OF YOUTH DRUG USE WORKING? No, Say Some Critics Of The `War On Drugs.' They Seek Education Programs That Emphasize Knowledge Over Complete Abstinence Reducing the risks of drug taking, rather than preaching zero tolerance, may be the most realistic way to get young people safely through adolescence in an age of broad legal and illicit drug use, say educators and parents who question whether the government1s "war on drugs" is a losing battle. Tweaking the slogan Just Say No, advocates of a new approach called Just Say Know are calling for a public health education campaign that broadens young people's knowledge about all drugs. Drug education as it has been traditionally taught is based on flawed goals, they say, and by refusing to settle for nothing short of complete abstinence, current efforts are unrealistic and doomed to failure. The level of drug use by young people has increased in this decade. A 1998 University of Michigan study for the National Institute on Drug Abuse found there was a slight decline in drug use among teen-agers in 1997, but in the six previous years the number of youngsters who tried a drug climbed significantly. Between 1991 and 1997, eighth-graders who experimented with drugs jumped from 19 to 29 percent; 10th-graders from 31 to 50 percent and 12th graders from 44 to 54 percent. "One of the problems with conventional drug education is the notion that we have the ability to prevent experimentation with drugs among teen-agers," said Marsha Rosenbaum, director of the Lindesmith Center-West, a drug policy research group in San Francisco. "If you combine the nature of teen-agers, which is risk-taking behavior, and the availability of a range of substances, it seems to me it makes substance experimentation almost inevitable," said Rosenbaum. According to proponents, the harm reduction approach, first developed in Great Britain and Australia, accepts the reality of drug use and works to minimize the dangers by providing information about, rather than against, drugs. A good place to begin is with caffeine, said Lynn Zimmer, a professor of sociology at Queens College at the City University of New York who specializes in drug policy issues and drug education. She worries that school programs and television ads stressing the debilitating consequences of hard drugs like heroin and cocaine may be abstractions to most children. Rather, she says, educators should deliver age-appropriate information about caffeine, nicotine and alcohol, drugs that young people are much more likely to encounter. Recent studies would seem to support doubts about the effectiveness of current drug programs. Several studies have shown that Project D.A.R.E., the drug education program taught by police officers in 10,000 communities nationwide, has no significant long-term effects on drug use. In the most recent study (released August 1, 1999), researchers at the University of Kentucky found that 20-year-olds who were schooled in the D.A.R.E. curriculum a decade earlier did not use any fewer drugs than those who did not go through the program. Zimmer isn1t surprised by the findings. The current focus on the horrors of substance abuse is similar to the vitriolic and ultimately impotent criticism of alcohol by the Women1s Christian Temperance Movement in the late 19th century, she says. "I wouldn1t say we have any evidence this sort of thing works. It1s not just a couple of years of saying they really haven1t proved themselves. It1s a century." Charlie Parsons, executive director of D.A.R.E. America, countered that the only thing wrong with his program is that children need more of it. The program is traditionally taught at the elementary school level, and the group is pushing educators to adopt it in middle and senior high schools as well. "If you give kids seventeen piano lessons in the sixth grade and they never touch it again, and then at twenty you say, 'Play us a song,' what is going to happen?" he asks. D.A.R.E. won1t stop the problem and isn1t a silver bullet, but it helps to change attitudes about drugs, he says. Seventy-five percent of public school districts agree and use the D.A.R.E. program. But one small, grassroots group is adopting a different approach. Since 1982, Mothers Against Misuse and Abuse has been taking its slide presentation, "Think Smart About Drugs" across the country. The organization was founded by a group of mothers in northern Oregon who were disturbed that while the availability of all drugs, especially prescription and over-the-counter brands, was growing, there was no easily accessible source of information about them. The group encourages potential users of all ages to ask themselves 7 questions before they take any drug: - -- What is the name of the chemical? - -- What part of the body does it affect? - -- What is the correct dosage? - -- What drug interactions will occur? - -- What allergic reactions can occur? - -- Will it produce tolerance? - -- Is it habit forming? "Drug education should be like driver1s education and gun safety education," said Sandee Burbank, MAMA1s founder and executive director. "Find good, accurate information." If well informed, most people make decisions in their own best interest, she added. In large measure, the successful drug education of children rests on trust, experts agree. If youngsters find out that even part of an antidrug message is inaccurate and or an ideological tool, there is the risk they will never come back or listen again. Rosenbaum recalled an interview she had with an addicted woman 20 years ago, which she included in a 1994 policy statement for the National Council on Crime and Delinquency. Rosenbaum said when she asked the young woman how she ended up in jail addicted to heroin, "I will never forget what she told me." The addicted woman said, "When I was in high school they had these so- called drug education classes. They told us if we used heroin we would become addicted. They told us if we used marijuana we would become addicted. Well, we all tried marijuana and found we did not become addicted, so we figured the entire message was B.S. I then tried heroin, got strung out, and here I am." Rosenbaum said: "We don1t know what works to prevent substance abuse. The idea of harm reduction is so new we really don1t have an evaluation of it yet. But we have a certain level of confidence that if teens are given accurate information they will tailor their behavior to minimize the risk." - --- MAP posted-by: Thunder