Program Description
Program Utilizes Real Life Drama to Educate Youth about Dangers of Drug Use
The Drug Store program uses positive prevention messages, factual information and realistic dramatizations to educate young people about the dangers of drug use. Using realistic props, students are directed through a series of nine stations, each dramatizing a step in the life of a student who uses drugs. Each professional “role player” is actually playing themselves including, in part, doctors, law enforcement, and clergy. The students are lead from an arrest stemming from an illegal drug purchase, to a court hearing and sentence upon conviction, and, ultimately, to a lethal drug overdose. The program concludes with a funeral dramatizing the possible consequences of making a wrong choice.
The Drug Store brings together agencies in a community wide effort to produce immediate and lasting changes in attitude and actions of participating youth. It is hoped the Drug Store will bring about change in its participants in the following ways: decrease substance abuse, decrease early onset of experimentation, decrease violence in schools and increase substance abuse awareness. Implementation
The Drug Store will be provided for all 6th grade students
For additional information on this program contact: Sgt. Linh Dinh at Dinh_Linh@montebello.k12.ca.us | STATISTICS | Statistics can be helpful in understanding the depth of the problem of substance abuse in teens. Below are some statistics about drug and alcohol use among adolescents.
Marijuana
National Statistics: - Marijuana is the Nation's most commonly used illicit drug. More than 83 million Americans (37 percent) age 12 and older have tried marijuana at least once.
- In 2001, marijuana was used by 76% of current illicit drug users.
- In 2001, 20% of 8th graders reported trying marijuana, and 9% were current users (defined as having used the drug in the past 30 days).
- Among 10th graders, 40% had tried marijuana, and almost 20% were current users in 2001.
- Among 12th graders, nearly half had tried marijuana, and 22% were current users in 2001.
- Marijuana was a contributing factor in more than 110,000 emergency department visits in the United States in 2001. About 15% of the patients were between the ages of 12 and 17 and almost two-thirds were male.
- Fifty-three percent of juvenile male and 38% of juvenile female arrestees tested positive for marijuana in 1999.
- Smoking 1 to 3 marijuana joints a day produces the same lung damage and cancer risk as smoking five times as many cigarettes.
- The Center on Addiction and Substance Abuse at Columbia University (CASA) found that adolescents who smoke pot are 85 times more likely to use cocaine than their non-smoking peers. They also found that 60% of adolescents who use marijuana before age 15 later go on to use cocaine.
- The Drug Abuse Warning Network (DAWN) has found that marijuana is the most frequently reported drug in emergency department visits related to drug abuse among youth age 12 to 19.
- In 2001, about 38,000 high school seniors in the U.S. reported that they crashed while driving under the influence of marijuana.
Sources:
2001 National Household Survey on Drug Abuse (NHSDA).
www.saddonline.com/stats.htm, SAMHSA.
The Drug Abuse Warning Network (DAWN), 2001.
The National Institute of Justice's Arrestee Drug Abuse Monitoring Program (ADAM), 1999.
www.intheknowzone.com/marijuana/stats.htm.
"The DAWN Report." Drug Abuse Warning Network, August 2003.
Unpublished estimate derived from U.S. Census Bureau and Monitoring the Future data from O'Malley, Patrick and Johnston, Lloyd, "Unsafe Driving by High School Seniors: National Trends from 1976 to 2001 in Tickets and Accidents After Alcohol, Marijuana and Other Illegal Drugs, "Journal of Studies on Alcohol, (64: 305-12), May 2003.
Inhalants
National Statistics: - One out of five students in America has used an inhalant to get high by the 8th grade.
- Fifty-five percent of the deaths linked to inhalant abuse are caused by Sudden Sniffing Death Syndrome, which can occur on the first use or any use.
- Twenty-two percent of inhalant abusers who died of Sudden Sniffing Death Syndrome were first-time users.
Sources:
www.inhalants.org/nipaw.html.
www.intheknowzone.com/inhalants/stats.htm.
Club Drugs
National Statistics: - In 2001, an estimated 8.1 million (3.6%) of Americans aged 12 or older had tried ecstasy at least once in their lifetime.
- Ecstasy is the most commonly used club drug, but only 2% of 8th through 12th graders use it on a regular basis.
- The number of high school students seen in emergency rooms for GHB use rose from 55 in 1994 to 4,969 in 2000, then declined to 3,340 in 2001.
"Tips for Teens: The Truth About Club Drugs." SAMHSA, 2000.
www.drugabuse.gov/Infofax/RohypnolGHB.html.
www.saddonline.com/stats.htm, SAMHSA.
General Drug Use Among Adolescents
National Statistics:
- Among youth aged 12 to 17, the rate of current illicit drug use was higher for boys (11.4%) than for girls (10.2%).
- In 2002, 53% of 12th graders reported having used an illicit drug in their lifetime.
- In 2002, between 13 and 18% of drivers aged 17 to 21 reported driving under the influence of an illicit drug in the past year.
- About 30% of adolescent suicides are attributed to depression, aggravated by drug or alcohol abuse.
- The United States has the highest rate of teen and young adult drug abuse in the world.
Sources:
www.saddonline.com/stats.htm, SAMHSA.
www.saddonline.com/stats.htm, Monitoring the Future.
Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration, National Survey on Drug Use and Health Report, "Drugged Driving 2002, Update, "September 16, 2003.
Somdahl, G. L., "Drugs and Kids: How Parents Can Keep Them Apart." Dimi Press; Salem: 1996. | | | |
