An insightful commentary piece in today's USA Today.

An excerpt:

"Four NFL prospects—Wisconsin's Anttaj Hawthorne and Jonathan Clinkscale, Clemson's Eric Coleman and Bowie State's Atcheson Conway—didn't have to wait long after reports they tested positive for marijuana at an NFL scouting combine to learn how such behavior would affect their future employment. While all four were considered mid- to low-round draft choices, only Hawthorne was taken in last weekend's draft."

It should be noticed that the developments with the NFL draft aren't necessarily a punitive action against marijuana users. However, it is evidence that America's career market is changing to reflect the realities of the harm caused to individuals from marijuana use.

Photos from Director Walters visit to Afghanistan are now available. Click here to view:

Click here to see more photos

We completed the second of four summits in our 2005 series of random student drug testing in St. Louis, Missouri yesterday. Once again, we were pleased with the number of participants and the level of interest of individuals in the greater St. Louis area. Approximately, 100 educators, administrators, law enforcement, and community leaders came together to educate themselves about the benefits of random student drug testing.

Mary Ann Solberg, Deputy Director of ONDCP, along with a panel of leaders in the student drug testing field spoke about developing student drug testing policies, legal considerations associated with starting and executing a program, technology used in administering random drug tests, the importance of a student assistance program and Federal grant opportunities. The information offered at the summit is for schools and communities to use in determining if this prevention tool is appropriate for their needs.

Here's an excerpt from the St. Louis Dispatch's story:

"Educators from across the region turned out Tuesday to hear the White House's deputy drug czar discuss the latest research supporting random student drug testing.

In addition to addressing the legal issues behind drug testing, the meeting provided information on $10 million in federal grants available for such programs.

"We know from countless studies that any time drug use in a school building goes up, performance on standardized tests goes down," said Mary Ann Solberg, deputy director of National Drug Control Policy. "This is to help kids—to allow kids to grow up healthy and drug-free."

More summits to come in:

• Pittsburgh, PA, May 5, 2005
  (Crowne Plaza Pittsburgh, 1160 Thorn Run Road)

• Portland, OR, May 11, 2005
  (Monarch Hotel, 12566 SE 93rd Avenue)

An Afghan Drug Lord with ties to the Taliban has been arrested. The announcement was made by U.S. Attorney David Kelley. According to a Bloomberg report:

"Noorzai is believed to have close ties to the Taliban, which allegedly protected his drug operations in return for demolitions, weaponry and manpower,'' according to a statement by Kelley.

Noorzai controlled fields in Afghanistan where poppies were grown and harvested to generate opium, the statement said. After the opium was harvested, Noorzai's organization used laboratories in Afghanistan and Pakistan to process the opium into heroin, according to the statement.

"The Afghan drug lords who control Afghanistan's heroin supply seek to destabilize the country's emerging democracy, to exploit its farmers, and to poison the youth of the West," Kelley said in the statement. "Our actions today will help to instead dismantle the Afghan drug trade and bring to justice the merchants of a powerful poison."

Hear (WMV file) what President Bush has said about drugs and terror.

Some insightful commentary on NPR regarding the underground marijuana culture. David Marcus, author of What It Takes To Pull Me Through: Why Teenagers Get in Trouble and How Four of Them Got Out, suggests turning every 4/20 into "Talk to Your Kids" day.

Generation Rx Emerging Category of Substance Abuse

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Scott Burns, our Deputy Director for State and Local Affairs, had a great interview with Wolf Blizter last night on CNN regarding the Partnership for a Drug Free America's (PDFA) new survey showing alarming signs of prescription drug abuse among young people. PDFA's survey found that about approximately one in five teenagers has abused a prescription painkiller to get high, and one in 11 has abused over the counter products, like cough medicine. Here's an excerpt of the interview:

"BLITZER: Let's talk about these legal drugs that kids are apparently finding in their parents'—in their medicine cabinets. What is the country supposed to do about this? What, if anything, can parents do about it, other than have a safe, and lock up their prescription drugs?

BURNS: Well, what America can do about it, and what the White House is doing, is implementing prescription monitoring programs in the states; about half of them have them now. We're having a serious discussion with physicians in this country about prescribing practices, and we're also going after the rogue internet providers or purveyors that pop up and try to get children to double click and have Vicodin delivered in three days.

What parents can do is, have discussions with your children and keep an eye on your medicine cabinet. You should know what's there. You should know how many pills you have, and if there's any possibility your children are going to take them, you should move them somewhere else, secure them."

Here's a link to the whole CNN transcript (you'll have to scroll down a bit).

Director Walters met with Hamed Karzai at the presidential palace in Kabul yesterday. BBC radio reports on the Director's meeting with Karzai:

"Karzai said, “During the current year, a number of Afghan farmers have voluntarily given up poppy cultivation. Thanks to the efforts and activities of counter-narcotics departments, poppy fields have been destroyed in various areas of the country. Therefore the farmer, whose poppy fields have been destroyed or who voluntarily gave up poppy cultivation, must be given help. This will further promote the acceleration of the poppy eradication campaign.” The president also said that “the provision of alternative livelihoods and crops was an important factor in preventing poppy cultivation.” He added that “the government was determined to convince farmers [not to grow poppy] by providing them with alternatives to stop poppy cultivation.” Walters stressed that “the USA would continue to provide help in the fight against drugs.” Walters said, “We would like to help the Afghan people to fight drugs and we would like to help the Afghan drug addicts to get rid of the habit.”

In Colombia, poppy cultivation was reduced by 52 percent from 2003–2004 thanks to an intensive eradication campaign. We hope the same progress can be made in Afghanistan. To read more about the Administration's efforts to disrupt the international market of illegal drugs, click here.

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This morning, Scott Burns, our Deputy Director for State and Local Affairs, joined officials from the DEA, FBI, ICE, the U.S. Postal Service, the F.D.A., and others in announcing the takedown of a major international internet drug ring as part of Operation "Cyber Chase". According to the DEA, the bust has led to 20 arrests made in the U.S. and abroad in Costa Rica, and India.

The e-traffickers used more than 200 websites to illicitly distribute pharmaceutical controlled substances like Vicodin, Xanax, and Oxycontin. Cyber Chase is part of DEA’s “On-Line Pharmacy Investigation Strategy” and works closely with other federal agencies to protect America from online drug dealers.

Here's what Director Walters had to say:

"Prescription drugs help millions of Americans every day. But their misuse is becoming a serious problem, abetted by drug traffickers who are using the Internet to attempt to subvert our medical prescription system. E-traffickers that target young people and those suffering from the disease of addiction are now the target of law enforcement action, while we continue to ensure proper access to needed medications. I would like to thank and applaud the agencies and offices involved in this investigation as their efforts truly make America safer."

Here's the Associated Press Story on CNN's website.

To report the sale and abuse of prescription drugs, call the D.E.A. at 1–877–RxAbuse.

To read more about the Bush Administrations strategy to combat prescription drug abuse read the National Synthetics Drugs Action Plan.

We had a great start to a series of random student drug testing events yesterday. Our first summit was held in Dallas, Texas and was attended by over 100 educators, parents, and community leaders. Our Deputy Director, Mary Ann Solberg, discussed the benefits of using random drug testing programs to prevent drug use in schools. Here are the dates and locations for the next events:

St. Louis, MO, April 26, 2005
(Renaissance Grand Hotel, 800 Washington Avenue)

Pittsburgh, PA, May 5, 2005
(Crowne Plaza Pittsburgh, 1160 Thorn Run Road)

Portland, OR, May 11, 2005
(Monarch Hotel, 12566 SE 93rd Avenue)

For more information on how to implement a random student drug testing program, click here.

A great Op-Ed co-written by some parents and a high school student in the Hampton Roads Daily Press. Here's what they're saying:

"[This student drug testing program] seeks to discourage demand for drugs by changing the school's environment in order to combat the single most important factor leading school children to take drugs, namely, peer pressure."

Who else agrees? More than 2,000 petition-signing concerned citizens in this community, of which 500 were students (including the entire Jamestown football team); the high school athletic booster clubs, head coaches, athletic directors and principals; the Lafayette High School PTSA Council; the commonwealth's attorney; the county sheriff; the 2003 Virginia General Assembly; the Virginia Department of Education; at least five Virginia public school divisions and hundreds of others across the country; the 2001 U.S. Congress; the White House Office of National Drug Control Policy; and President Bush.

After reviewing Internet research of pro and con arguments (including that the study most often cited by opponents has been discarded as unscientific and fatally flawed by many experts such as National Drug Control Policy Director John Walters), we interviewed schools that utilize random testing to get their direct feedback. Here's what they told us: It works for their students and it can work for ours."

Interested in starting your own random drug testing program? Find out more by reading What You Need to Know About Starting a Student Drug-Testing Program.

Working with the Oregon Governor's office, Oregon State Police, and with Fox 12 Television in Portland, the Oregon Partnership has produced two brand new meth PSAs that demonstrate the dangers to innocent children posed by meth cook operations. The Oregon Partnership provides support for drug and alcohol prevention education and treatment referral services. They also receive funding through the Drug-Free Communities program.

Click on the ad to watch:

Ad 1

Ad 2

This week, the Drug Free Communities program launched a way for anti-drug coalitions to learn about successful strategies employed by their peers. Check out the first issue of E-Strategies.

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As if Meth wasn't already bad enough. Many of us know that meth leads to addiction, violence, and death for too many people. Now we're hearing that family pets are bearing the burden of meth production as well. KATU TV out of Portland, Oregon reports:

"The chemicals used to make methamphetamine can eat away at your skin and are generally bad for your health, but did you ever think about what they can do to animals?

According to the Humane Society of the Mid-Willamette Valley, they are actually seeing more and more family pets turning up at their doors contaminated and hurting from those types of chemicals.

The long-term effects on animals can be devastating because the toxic chemicals can eat away at the animal's skin, just like it does on humans.

The animals, which can include everything from dogs to rabbits and birds, need extensive washing and medication to get rid of the contamination and restore their health.

For example, Mattie is a three-year-old Pit Bull that police found when they busted a methamphetamine lab in West Linn.

The chemicals used to make the drug had burned the fur off her face and chest, leaving it raw and sore.

Humane society officials across the state say the number of pets removed from methamphetamine-infected homes has increased and even doubled in the past year."

Watch the report.

See the Ads

We launched a new ad campaign today to provide hard facts about the harms and risks of pot use. The ads are aimed at parents of teens and discuss increased potency and carcinogenic content of marijuana. The ads ran in today's New York Times, USA Today, The Washington Post and The Wall Street Journal. During the course of the next four months, they'll also run in Newsweek, BusinessWeek, Time and Smithsonian magazines.

Here's the rundown:

• Kids who are regular marijuana users often have shortened attention spans, decreased energy and ambition, lack of judgment, high distractibility, and impaired ability to communicate and relate to others—a set of symptoms called “amotivational syndrome” by psychologists.
• Kids who regularly smoke marijuana often make risky decisions about driving or sex.
• Using marijuana can lead to symptoms of depression and thoughts of suicide.
• Regular marijuana use can lead to breathing problems and greater exposure to cancerous chemicals than from tobacco. In fact, one marijuana cigarette can deliver four times as much cancer-causing tar as one tobacco cigarette.
• Marijuana today is more than twice as powerful on average as it was 20 years ago. It contains twice the concentration of THC, the chemical that affects the brain.

You can read our press release about the ads.

The evidence keeps piling up. Another study that will be published in Biological Psychiatry finds that one in four pot users are at risk for psychosis. According to a story from Britain's Times Online:

ONE in four people carries genes that increases vulnerability to psychotic illnesses if he or she smokes cannabis as a teenager, scientists have found.

A common genetic profile that makes cannabis five times more likely to trigger schizophrenia and similar disorders has been identified, increasing pressure on the Government to reverse the drug’s reclassification from Class B to Class C.

Read the whole Times Online story.

Read other blog posts regarding marijuana's links to mental health problems:

• More Reporting on Marijuana's Links to Psychosis
• Director Walters Briefed by Researchers Regarding links between Marijuana and Mental Disorders During Visit to the United Kingdom

Jim Toner, a columnist with the Orlando Sentinel gets it right. Many parents have old attitudes about drug use (registration required):

"For a couple of decades, drug use was cool and uncomplicated. Only a few uptight authoritarian figures saw problems with it. As a result, people felt they could chill out and luxuriate in this newfound recreational haze.

Eventually, reality blew that haze away. Drugs could damage. Cocaine was addictive, particularly in a form called crack. Crack created a doomed social class that survives only on an addiction financed by crime."

It's prom and graduation season. Erath High School in Erath, Louisiana is making sure students are playing it safe this year. All 300 kids attending prom will have to pass a breathalyzer test:

"We just want to make sure we have an alcohol-free prom. This is a school and it has to be an alcohol and drug-free environment."

"This is the breathalyzer they will be using. Students will have to blow into the machine and wait for the response. If it's green, they can go and if it's red, they face consequences."

"We will contact the parent and come have them picked up and hold them in the gym until they pick them up."

School administration says they have no intention to arrest anyone. They just want to keep the prom safe. And students agree after seeing what has gone on at some past proms.

Also, an encouraging report out of Afghanistan in yesterday's Chicago Tribune (registration required):

"Early last month, the State Department warned that Afghanistan was in danger of becoming a narcotics state and that the country's heroin production "represents an enormous threat to world stability."

But this year, by all indications, fewer poppies are being grown nationwide. President Hamid Karzai declared a holy war on poppies after his election in October. A new Counternarcotics Ministry was created. The international community stepped up its anti-poppy campaign. Local officials and the police—a number of whom were involved in the drug trade—appeared to take poppy fighting more seriously.

A recent report from the United Nations and the Afghan government said that poppy production has fallen in 29 of the country's 34 provinces. Farmers told surveyors that they stopped growing poppies because they feared the government's ban and eradication."

Click here to see more photos

Director Walters had a productive and positive visit to Cincinnati yesterday. His first stop was the annual PRIDE youth drug prevention conference. At the event, Director Walters encouraged over 3,000 young people in the audience to stay away from marijuana and other drugs that can ruin their futures. Hope Taft, first lady of Ohio, and Jay DeWispelaere, President and CEO of PRIDE also addressed the crowd and discussed recent reductions in nationwide youth drug use.

Following his visit to PRIDE, Director Walters met with staff and clients at the First Step Home in the Walnut Hills neighborhood. First Step provides drug treatment services to women who have become addicted to drugs. Officials from First Step discussed an innovative program they have implemented which employs drug-addicted women with a local catering company. First Step has helped hundreds of women get their lives back on track. Following his meeting with staff and clients, Director Walters held a news conference to draw attention to SAMHSA's latest report on marijuana treatment admissions. The Cincinnati Enquirer ran a great story:

You can read the rest of the Enquirer story here.

The visit generated a lot of local television coverage as well. Here's an excerpt from the local ABC affiliate's report:

"If you think marijuana or pot is safe and harmless, the White House drug czar says you believe in a "dangerous myth." During a trip to Cincinnati, drug czar John Walters says treatment admissions for marijuana alone have tripled over the last decade.

Walters was in Cincinnati in part for a world youth anti-drug pride conference at Cinergy Center. But the drug czar's latest message is that pot is no longer just a "gateway" to other illegal drugs, but is powerful enough now to be a health hazard, all by itself.

He says old attitudes toward marijuana in the 1960s and 1970s are now dangerous because today's pot is so much more powerful. "Today, high potency marijuana, by the dose and by weight, can be as potent as cocaine and methamphetamine and ice," Walters said.

Walters points to national emergency room admissions for marijuana reactions and addictions, which have doubled to 120,000 a year just over five years. He also says in Cincinnati the percentage of people in drug treatment programs for marijuana addictions jumped from 13% in 1992 to more than 30% a decade later.

Read WCPO's whole report here.

Photos from this week's opening of DEA's Target America exhibit are now available. Click here to view.

AVERAGE POTENCY OF TESTED CANNABIS SAMPLES

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The influx of highly potent pot coming from Canada to the United States is attracting more international attention. The United Kingdom's Guardian printed an excellent report on this alarming and violent trend:

"BC Bud is so well thought of on the west coast it has been known to trade at the same price as cocaine, more than $3,000 a pound. In fact, it is commonly bartered for cocaine and guns, which travel in the opposite direction, north into Canada, making it a less safe and predictable place—and more like America—every day.

Drive-by killings are on the rise in the Vancouver area, as are house invasions, by which one gang seeks to take over another's marijuana crop without the bother of grow lights and hydroponic cultivation.

About a month ago four officers of the Royal Canadian Mounted Police were shot dead when they stumbled on a BC Bud-growing operation—the most Mounties lost in one day since the middle of the 19th century.

The killings shocked Canada, and have challenged the country's generally tolerant attitude towards drug offences.

"It showed Canadians that the people who have grow-ops [growing operations] aren't all nice guys with mom-and-pop operations," said Inspector Paul Nadeau, the head of the force's coordinated marijuana enforcement team in British Columbia. "Nothing could be further from the truth. Every single criminal organisation in the region is involved."

Marijuana: Harmless?

Read the whole story.

A great column ran in the Eugene, Oregon's Register Guard newspaper the other day. In the piece, Michael Spasaro and Jim Feldkamp discuss progress in fighting drug abuse:

"Drug abuse has been around for thousands of years, but we have made significant progress in fighting drug use and trafficking in America. On the demand side, the U.S. has reduced casual use, chronic use and addiction, and has prevented others from even using drugs.

In 1974, 25.4 million Americans used illegal drugs; in 2001 that number dropped to 15.9 million. That means that 5 percent of the American population use illegal drugs and 95 percent of us do not.

We can curtail drug abuse, reducing it to level that prevailed before 1960. The solution lies with education and changing the American people's attitude toward the use of illegal drugs.

Can it be done? We have done it! Look at our fight against an addictive drug that kills—nicotine, usually in the form of cigarettes. It took us 40 years, but we are winning that war. This was accomplished with education and changing the attitude of the American people."

Spasaro and Feldkamp go on to write about recent efforts to legalize so-called "medical" marijuana in their state:

"When Prozanski, D-Eugene, and state Rep. Phil Barnhart, D-Eugene, sponsor legislation that supports medical marijuana, how can we tell our children that drugs are bad for you? When we put the word "medical" in front of a drug, does it not affect the attitude of our youth? It is not a coincidence that in our state, marijuana use among 18- to 24-year-olds is 65 percent higher than the national average.

Does that mean that everyone who uses marijuana will go on to harder drugs? Of course not. However, during our time in law enforcement we never met a meth addict who did not first use marijuana."

Read the entire column.

Last night, Director Walters addressed parents and school officials during a town hall meeting sponsored by Northern Virginia Congressman Frank Wolf. Representative Wolf hosted the program to educate parents and students about the dangers of drugs and alcohol—especially as prom and graduation season approaches. The event took place at McLean High School and featured speakers from MADD, the Drug Enforcement Administration, and Inova Fairfax Hospital. Koren Zailckas, author of the book Smashed: A story of a drunken childhood also shared her experiences with alcohol abuse. Several audience members suggested using random student drug testing as a way of helping parents prevent drug use before it starts.

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The Drug Enforcement Administration's Target America exhibit is moving on to Detroit, Michigan. The museum just finished a successful run in New York City's Times Square and will open again at the New Detroit Science Center tomorrow. The exhibit will be open until October 2nd. While the exhibit was open in New York, thousands of visitors stopped in to see relics and displays showing the links between drugs and terrorism. The exhibit also contains various interactive displays which show the science behind drug addiction.

Drug traffickers have grown increasingly accustomed to using terrorist acts to sustain their activities. As profits from the sale of illegal drugs have increased over the years, the individuals and organizations involved in trafficking have used more drastic means to secure their fortunes and keep law enforcement and governments at arms' length.

Shortly after the September 11th attacks, ONDCP launched a series of ads illustrating the links between drugs and terrorism. Check out ONDCP's drugs and terror media gallery to watch the drug and terror ads and watch what President Bush has said about drugs and terror in America.

Go to www.TargetAmerica.org to visit the museum online.

See photos from the event.