News and Articles

The Santa Fe County Board of County Commissioners has passed a resolution declaring February 2008 as “Drug Prevention and Education Month.”  The resolution urges County communities, schools, parents, and youth to engage in, and carry out, appropriate prevention and education activities and programs to reduce and stop drug use before it starts.  Data bears out the need for a comprehensive effort:

• Vicodin remains one of the most commonly abused drugs among 12th graders, with 10% reporting non-medical use within the past year;
•  25 percent of youth in the 10th grade reported using marijuana during the past year; and
•  youth who first smoke marijuana under the age of 14 are more than 5 times as likely to abuse drugs in adulthood; and
• nearly six percent of 12th grade students have used over-the-counter cough and cold medications in the past year for the purpose of getting high
• the total economic cost of drug, alcohol, and tobacco abuse in the United States is more than $500,000,000,000

There are four critical components to prevention: youth, parents, schools (including colleges and universities), and communities and social environments that must be reinforced by each other to have the greatest effect in deterring the consequences of drug use.  The Board supports community anti-drug coalitions as an essential component of any drug prevention and education campaign because they are data driven, know our community epidemiology, and are capable of understanding and implementing the multi-sector interventions required to reduce the availability and use of drugs.  “The more successful we are at general prevention of drug use in younger adolescents” said Commissioner Harry Montoya, “the less we will have to deal with the concomitant economic and societal consequences of their use.”