Transcript Drugs and resistance skills Principle 2

DRUGS AND
RESISTANCE SKILLS
By: Carissa Hosea and Amy Gilvin
Preventing Principles
Principle 2: Prevention programs should address all forms of drug abuse, alone or in
combination, including the underage use of legal drugs (e.g., tobacco or alcohol); the use of
illegal drugs (e.g., marijuana or heroin); and the inappropriate use of legally obtained substances
(e.g., inhalants), prescription medications, or over-the-counter drugs
Principle 3: Prevention programs should address the type of drug abuse problem in the local
community, target modifiable risk factors, and strengthen identified protective factors.
Principle 4: Prevention programs for elementary school children should target improving
academic and social-emotional learning to address risk factors for drug abuse, such as early
aggression, academic failure, and school dropout. Education should focus on the following
skills:
• self-control;
• emotional awareness;
• communication;
• social problem-solving; and
• academic support, especially in reading.
From: Preventing Drug Use among Children and Adolescents: A Research-Based Guide for Parents, Educators, and
Community Leaders, Second Edition
D.A.R.E. Program
•
The Drug Abuse Resistance Education program is used in nearly 80% of the
school districts in the United States, in 54 other countries around the world,
and is taught to 36,000,000 students each year.
• Scientific evaluation studies have consistently shown that DARE is ineffective
in reducing the use of alcohol and drugs and is sometimes even
counterproductive.
• The estimated cost of DARE annually is already $1 to 1.3 billion.
• The U.S. Department of Education prohibits schools from spending its
funding on DARE. The funding comes from other departments and tax payers
dollars
• DARE has made about a dozen revisions to its program. Each time another
study reports that the program is ineffective, DARE responds by saying that
the results apply to "the old program." Each revision has proven to be just as
ineffective as the one it follows, but it's a very effective tactic to distract and
confuse the public.
• Preliminary evaluations have found the rates of alcohol and drug use among
students participating in the "new" DARE program to be the same as those
among students using the old, failed DARE.
Alternative Prevention Programs
• Life Skills Training Program (LST) -LST is a school-based
substance abuse prevention program for students 10-14 years
of age. It teaches general personal and social skills, specific
resistance skills, and normative information.
• Project ALERT - Project ALERT is also a school-based
program, in this case for students in middle school. It teaches
drug abstention norms, reasons to abstain, and resistance skills.
• Strengthening Families Program (SFP) - SFP is a substance
abuse prevention program for substance-abusing families with
children six to12 years of age.
Alcohol
Alcohol is one of the most widely used drug substances in the world. Alcohol use and binge drinking among
our nation’s youth is a major public health problem:
•
Alcohol is used by more young people in the United States than tobacco or illicit drugs.
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Excessive alcohol consumption is associated with approximately 75,000 deaths per year.
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Alcohol is a factor in approximately 41% of all deaths from motor vehicle crashes.
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Among youth, the use of alcohol and other drugs has been linked to unintentional injuries, physical
fights, academic and occupational problems, and illegal behavior.
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Long-term alcohol misuse is associated with liver disease, cancer, cardiovascular disease, and neurological
damage as well as psychiatric problems such as depression, anxiety, and antisocial personality disorder.
•
Drug use contributes directly and indirectly to the HIV epidemic, and alcohol and drug use contribute
markedly to infant morbidity and mortality.
As of 1988, all states prohibit the purchase of alcohol by youth under the age of 21 years. Underage drinking
is defined as consuming alcohol prior to the minimum legal drinking age of 21 years. Current alcohol use
among high school students remained steady from 1991 to 1999 and then decreased from 50% in 1999 to 42%
in 2009. In 2009, 24% of high school students reported episodic heavy or binge drinking.
Zero tolerance laws in all states make it illegal for youth under age 21 years to drive with any measurable
amount of alcohol in their system (i.e., with a blood alcohol concentration (BAC) ≥ 0.02). In 2009, 10% of
high school students reported driving a car or other vehicle during the past 30 days when they had been
drinking alcohol. In addition, 28% of students reported riding in a car or other vehicle during the past 30 days
driven by someone who had been drinking alcohol.
Tobacco
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Tobacco use, including cigarette smoking, cigar smoking, and smokeless
tobacco use, remains the leading preventable cause of death in the United
States.
Each year cigarette smoking accounts for approximately 1 of every 5 deaths,
or about 443,000 people.
•
Cigarette smoking results in 5.1 million years of potential life lost in the
United States annually.
•
Each day in the United States, approximately 3,600 young people between the
ages of 12 and 17 years initiate cigarette smoking, and an estimated 1,100
young people become daily cigarette smokers.
•
In 2009, 19% of high schools students reported current cigarette use and 14%
reported current cigar use. In addition, 9% of high school students and 20%
of white male high school students reported current smokeless tobacco use.
REFERENCES
http://drugabuse.gov/prevention/index.html
http://alcoholfacts.org/DARE.html
http://www.cdc.gov/healthyyouth/healthtopics/index.htm