DARE DRUG PROGRAME IS FAILING

NEW evidence suggesting recent campaigns using high-profile drug
educators have failed, shows good intentions are no substitute for
effective anti-drug education.

Here in the United States the high-profile Drug Abuse Resistance
Education programme is finally being acknowledged as the failure it
is. Every methodologically sound, independent evaluation has found it
either ineffective or counterproductive. Its scare tactics do more
harm than good. Students who realise they are being lied to about
cannabis often make the mistake of assuming that harder drugs are
relatively harmless as well.

This is a recipe for disaster. Anti-drug education needs to be
reality-based or it will backfire when kids are inevitably exposed to
drug use among their peers. After almost two decades of Dare, heroin
use in high school seniors has reached record levels. Minimising drug
use requires strategies of proven effectiveness, not "feel good"
programmes that please parents, educators and police.

Robert Sharp

Lindesman Centre Drug Policy Foundation

Washington