Pubdate: Mon, 19 Feb 2001 Source: New York Times (NY) Copyright: 2001 The New York Times Company Contact: 229 West 43rd Street, New York, NY 10036 Fax: (212) 556-3622 Website: http://www.nytimes.com/ Forum: http://forums.nytimes.com/comment/ Section: Opinion: Letters to the Editor Author: Gilbert J. Botvin FIGHTING DRUG ABUSE To the Editor: Re "Antidrug Program Says It Will Adopt a New Strategy" (front page, Feb. 15): Drug Abuse Resistance Education, known as DARE, should be commended on finally recognizing that its approach to drug abuse prevention was ineffective. Schools interested in offering their students an effective drug abuse prevention program do not need to wait for DARE to recreate itself. Effective alternatives to DARE have already been rigorously tested and shown to produce lasting reductions in teenage drug use. Given the magnitude of the drug problem in our country, it is vitally important that we use our limited prevention resources to support approaches that have already been tested and demonstrated to work. GILBERT J. BOTVIN New York, Feb. 15, 2001 The writer is director of the Institute for Prevention Research, Weill Medical College of Cornell University. - --- MAP posted-by: Jay Bergstrom