Surprisingly, kids and even many parents have biased attitudes in the substance use arena. A kid’s world is smaller, relatively brief and very selective. They see what they see. Some see and encounter responsible use of alcohol or no use and assume that this is normal. Others see excessive use of alcohol around them and assume that everyone drinks, or will eventually drink. On average maybe 13% of substance abusers will actually go on to become addicts. Yet there are risk factors, genetic, social, etc that can move your risk up to 400%.  The media more often than not presents drinking and substance using as a popular and mostly harmless pastime, a simple and reversible choice and also a good coping mechanism.

Red Ribbon reminds us that we all have choices. If your friends drink, well, you still get to decide if you will drink. Accepting that everyone is doing it just isn’t accurate. It is only a convenient excuse to make the choice easier -for kids and for parents.

We have talked before about Assembly bill (A 9016) and a Senate bill (S 4041 B) that would, in effect, make marijuana a legal medical drug.

But these kids were asking about smoking. Marijuana is smoked -right! Smoking can be good, apparently.

Sure, kids will understand the difference between legal medicine and THC rich “street” marijuana. It’s not as if misuse of legal prescription drugs is already growing in school age populations across the country.  (However it is according to SAMHSA and a few teachers. I have talked to).  It’s not as if we’re confusing them even more?

Shouldn’t parents and teachers of middle schoolers in New York State participate in both sides of this debate? Maybe the kids don’t know the facts (and that’s some evidence that there hasn’t been enough discussion), but at least they are trying to find facts.

Teachers and parents as a collective, seem to be overwhelmed with expectations (on them) or are moving in that direction. Their responsibilities have grown far beyond instructing. Any caring teacher, and most are, understands he or she must also be a part-time parent and a counselor.

Teachers need to be able to engage, motivate and teach. To keep kids engaged they also need to care about their individual needs and respond effectively to: health and wellness issues, self-confidence, personal safety, bullying, sexuality, domestic violence, absentee parents, addiction in the home and sometimes even parent criminality.  Teachers and parents have about the same responsibilities but at different times of the day. Teachers can be with kids more waking hours than parents and the responsibilities grow.

Should we add one more challenge and make smokable Marijuana even a little more available to kids than it already is?  What is the cost? The benefit? We hear a lot of pro and con about making marijuana more acceptable and less criminal for adults. Either way, there is always some impact on kids and classrooms. What would teachers say?

According to Dr. Kerry O’Brien, one of the report’s co-authors, alcohol companies spend about 80% of their advertising budget on athletics/sports. According to one source, the participants actually thought on average that athletes drank 12% less than they themselves did.

Dr. O’Brien says that “there is much stronger evidence for a relationship between alcohol-industry sponsorship, advertising and marketing within sport and hazardous drinking among young people than there is for the influence of sports stars drinking.”

“We are not suggesting that sports stars should not be encouraged to drink responsibly, but it’s disingenuous to place the blame on them for setting the bad example.”

The research for this study was done at three universities in both the United Kingdom and Australia and consisted of interviews with over 1,000 students. Professor Greg Kolt said that “there very much is a culture of drinking that’s associated with sport” and that sports organizations need to start thinking about if their relationship with alcohol companies is wise.

What do you think?

The Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA) was created in 1992 to help reduce the impact of substance abuse and mental health disorders on communities throughout the country. According to their website, “people with mental and substance use disorders, because of their illness, have largely been excluded from the current health care system and rely on public ‘safety net’ programs.”

Bryan Hullihen, Executive Director of the High Standards Recovery center, says that he thinks part of the rise in diagnosis of co-occurring disorders is because of increased awareness amongst the public. The efforts of SAMHSA and the countless facilities across the country working to treat  co-occurring disorders have been a significant factor in this increased awareness.

A recent publication from the Canadian Center on Substance Abuse (CCSA) took an in-depth look at Concurrent Disorders. CCSA’s Deputy Chief Executive Officer, Rita Notarandrea, says that “treating each problem separately leads to poor client outcomes that are characterized by frequent relapses and crises, placing undue strain on the healthcare system and its professionals.” As such, CCSA has released a list of critical needs that Canada must address in order to more successfully handle concurrent disorders… check them out here. Some of these are similar to the objectives laid out in the SAMHSA strategic plan, which you can read here.

Read about this potential new legislation in Colorado here, then let us know what you think about North America’s efforts to treat co-occurring disorders.

The debate for parents of teenagers is a difficult one–do you strictly prohibit drinking or promote doing so in moderation and while making safe decisions? Do you allow your children to have a glass of wine or beer in your home, or not allow any alcohol what-so-ever?

One recent article tells the story of a mother who told her son not to drink, but also told him that if he did drink he absolutely shouldn’t drive. He died of alcohol poisoning with a BAC of .41 at age 18, shortly after graduating high school and moving out with a friend, when friends convinced him to chug rum. His mother has told her younger son that she doesn’t want him to drink until he is 21, and to the best of her knowledge he hasn’t.

Another story in the same article told of a mother who has broken up parties her kids were at and grounded them for drinking when they were in their younger teens. Now that they are in there later teens, she allows the occasional beer or glass of wine but will not serve their friends. For her 18 year old son’s prom and his spring break trip, she took measures such as organizing a limo and taking away car keys to try to ensure their safety.

Although she would never provide alcohol to her kids, she knows that the risk is there. “It’s probably unrealistic, she says, for parents to forbid alcohol to older teens outright. Instead, she teaches moderation, safety and responsibility.”

The struggle that parents encounter on these topics is certainly not without cause. Over the weekend 12 students at the University of Massachusetts Amherst, at an annual event this article calls Blackout Weekend. According to statistics, 1,700 college students die each year in alcohol related incidents, or 4 students every day; almost 600,000 are injured unintentionally; nearly 700,000 are assaulted and an additional 97,000 are sexually assaulted.

Officials at the University of Iowa are changing their freshman orientation alcohol education segment in order to try and prevent some of these alcohol related tragedies. This year’s presentation will be interactive, and encourage students and their parents to talk about issues. Parents will take the same seminar as their children, instead of hearing a separate presentation as they have in past years. University officials hope that these conversations will continue on the drive home, and throughout the student’s college experiences. I think that this is a step in the direction and it will be interesting to hear feedback and statistics from the university after implementing this approach.

What do you think about the underage drinking problem in the United States? What can we do to help work against it?

This week, she was sentenced to 5 years probation and a $1,000 fine, and has lost her license. I have to say I was initially a little surprised that she wasn’t sentenced to some period of jail time. She had a clean record before this incident, and there appear to have been circumstances in her personal life the the judge felt required leniency.

She received a phone call that her father was about to pass, which is what led her to get in the car. These circumstances don’t make her actions acceptable, but in combination with her previously clean record they did enable the judge to show her mercy. Hopefully this will be an isolated incident in her life, and a stern warning to others who think it is acceptable in ANY circumstance to drive under the influence — especially with kids in the car.

When asked about the ruling, Norse said “I’m just very sorry for everything that happened that night and the way that everything turned out. It was just a bad night and that’s all.”

Last year, this partnership resulted in over 1,000 residents safely disposing of almost 3,000 pounds of pharmaceutical waste. Appointments aren’t needed.

The remaining three collections this year will be:

• June 19th, Eastway Wegmans at 1955 Empire Blvd
• August 14th, Chili-Paul Wegmans at 3175 Paul Rd and
• October 2nd, Penfield Wegmans at 2157 Penfield Rd

The county is holding a separate collection this Sunday, April 25th, from 1 pm to 4 pm at the Jewish Community Federation at 441 East Ave. Read the press release here for more information.

I’m curious about what regulations concerning smoking will come out of this process–if there will be new restrictions, new incentives to quit smoking, or nothing at all. Here are some current happenings in the smoking debate:

• A study by the Harvard School of Public Health and the Center for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) investigated flavored tobacco products that resemble candy, which can entice children to try them and have incredibly harmful effects.
• The movement against e-cigarettes continues as several states try to outlaw the devices. There is not enough known about these products to say, one way or the other, if they are a safer alternative to normal cigarettes. Numerous agencies have put out statements saying that they are not recommended as a smoking cessation method. Read more here and here.
• Research continues to suggest that smoking and depression have a direct relationship. Specifically, individuals 20 or older that suffer from depression are twice as likely to smoke, and as depression becomes more severe the percentage of smokers increases.

One article that I found suggests that expanding Medicaid coverage for cessation programs can help more individuals in their struggle to quit and save money down the road because of the numerous diseases that have a link to smoking. Unfortunately I haven’t been able to dig up much else on this matter.

What do you know about smoking and health care reform? What are your other questions about health care reform and addiction? Let us know what you’re thinking.