The $2 billion federally sponsored campaign to keep kids from using drugs is putting the government into the unfamiliar business of measuring advertising effectiveness. U.S. drug czar Barry R. McCaffrey, a retired four-star general, knows a lot about accountability in the military. Friday, he said he would hold Madison Avenue to the same high standard. "There are no points for style," Gen. McCaffrey said in an address to the American Association of Advertising Agencies, many of whom provide free creative work for the campaign, which was launched in 1998. "We've got to achieve an outcome. We have to change the way Americans act," the general said at the group's annual meeting in Amelia Island, Fla. [continues 730 words]
The $2 billion federally sponsored campaign to keep kids from using drugs is putting the government into the unfamiliar business of measuring advertising effectiveness. U.S. drug czar Barry R. McCaffrey, a retired four star general, knows a lot about accountability in the military. Friday, he said he would hold Madison Avenue to the same high standard. "There are no points for style," Gen. McCaffrey said in an address to the American Association of Advertising Agencies, many of whom provide free creative work for the campaign, which was launched' in 1998. "We've got to achieve an outcome. We have to change the way Americans act," the general said at the group's annual meeting in Amelia Island, Fla. [continues 730 words]
WASHINGTON--Hammering home the need for a strategy that measures success and failure, the Clinton administration is announcing a fivepart plan designed to cut the size of the nation's drug problem in half by 2007. In a threevolume report to Congress, White House drug policy director Barry R. McCaffrey said drugs cost the country more than 14,000 lives annually, despite a nationwide effort that includes close to $18 billion spent this year by the federal government. President Clinton said that, although "there is some encouraging progress in the struggle against drugs, . . . the social costs of drug use continue to climb." In a message to Congress, Clinton said the positive signs include a growing view among young people that drugs are risky and a continuing decline in cocaine production abroad. [continues 245 words]
