Pubdate: Mon, 09 Mar 2009
Source: Vancouver Sun (CN BC)
Copyright: 2009 The Vancouver Sun
Contact: http://www.canada.com/vancouversun/letters.html
Website: http://www.canada.com/vancouversun/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/477
Author: Denise Ryan
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/find?241 (Methamphetamine - Canada)
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/mdma.htm (Ecstasy)
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/youth.htm (Youth)

METH SOCIETY ATTACKS DRUG MYTHS

Education Can Help Keep Youths From Addiction, Group Says

One out of every five students who filled out a survey form after an 
anti-drug group's presentation last year said they know of someone 
using crystal meth, and nearly half said they know of someone using ecstasy.

"The survey results show just how easy it is to get drugs like 
crystal meth and ecstasy and an alarming lack of knowledge about how 
easy it is to slip into using them," said Mark McLaughlin, executive 
director of the Crystal Meth Society of BC.

McLaughlin presented the statistics to the Federation of 
Municipalities' standing committee on community safety and crime 
prevention at a time of escalating public concern about drug-related 
gang violence.

"One of the goals for the Crystal Meth Society is to stop the 
creation of the client base that funds the gangs," McLaughlin said 
Friday in Victoria. "This is without a doubt, part of the solution to 
combating drugs and gangs in B.C."

McLaughlin's group conducted the survey by asking students to fill 
out forms after they heard the group's "Meth Info Show," which was 
presented in various schools around the province over a 12-month 
period last year. A total of 2,715 students in Grades 6 to 12 filled 
out the forms.

More than 40 per cent of respondents showed a lack of understanding 
about how drug dealers get people hooked, the survey showed.

It also showed that 47 per cent of students know someone using 
ecstasy and that more than 40 per cent don't realize that crystal 
meth is sometimes laced into other street drugs like ecstasy, cocaine 
and even marijuana.

"From school to school, the statistics consistently showed similar 
results," said McLaughlin, who founded the group when one of his own 
children became hooked on the highly addictive drug and he couldn't 
find any help.

"When you're walking the midnight streets looking for your lost child 
and you bump into other parents doing the same thing, looking for 
their kids you start to realize the scope of the problem."

Although his own child is off the drug "sleeping at night, and 
working," McLaughlin said the problem isn't going away.

Results from the survey also show that 94 per cent of students would 
not use crystal meth after seeing the Meth Info show; 75 per cent 
don't know of any organizations in their community that address the 
problem of crystal meth, and 37 per cent say crystal meth is easily 
available. Eight per cent have been offered the drug.

Minister of Education Shirley Bond recently awarded the CMBC $50,000 
with a mandate to continue to educate the public, and develop a 
"pedagogically appropriate product" for kids in Grades 4 and 5.

"We believe forewarned is forearmed," said McLaughlin. "Crystal meth 
isn't just another drug. It presents a clear and urgent danger."

He noted that in Victoria recently, "we had half a dozen young 
children overdose on pills that the dealer sold as ecstasy but it was 
pure meth."

He said he's grateful his own child is doing better, but he's also 
painfully aware of "the other families whose children are dead and 
buried in the ground."
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MAP posted-by: Jay Bergstrom