WWWWF:No butts about it
Effort to curb youth smoking should be used to combat prescription drug abuse
As much as those commercials encouraging parents to help keep their kids from smoking annoy me with their cheesiness, I can't help but admit to their effectiveness (someone even blogs about these things).
It also makes me wish this kind of movement was aiming for the growing numbers of kids gulping down prescription medication like Red Bulls.
The benefit of the anti-smoking campaign comes to light with the Monitoring the Future survey that shows to steady stumble in the level of youths picking up cancer sticks.
The latest stats point to 9 percent of 8th graders and less than a quarter of 10th and 12th graders having lit up in the previous month, compared to 1996's 21 percent for 8th-graders and more than 30 percent for 10th and 12th graders.
What's more, all the data about how bad cigs are has gotten through the Brittany Spears and Smosh - Hardcore Max crowding young minds and made an impression. In 2005, nearly eight out of 10 12th graders didn't think smoking one or more packs of cigarettes per day was a good idea.
So kids have gotten the message that the Marlboro Man has no kids for a reason.
Parents still need to know the dangers posed by their own medicine cabinets.
The levels of kids abusing prescriptions is certainly dwarfed by the numbers abusing illegal drugs, but the trend is the trouble. Illicit drug use is falling while medication abuse continues climbing. So, while just under 3 percent of 8th graders reported abusing OxyContin in 2006, that was still double the number of 2002. Tenth- and 12th-grader levels stayed stable but high, according to the NIH.
But those tiny numbers aren't a reason to ignore the issue. In fact, they are the reason some commercial campaign like the smoking work should be implemented. Now's the time to head off problems before it reaches epidemic levels.