DRUG-USE HARM 'MINIMIZATION' WITH EDUCATION

Bad outcomes from drug use among senior high-school students can be
significantly reduced by education.

That was the major finding of a four-year study by Dalhousie professor
Christiane Poulin, one of North America's leading researchers into
drug use by secondary school students.

Poulin, who also holds a Canada Research Chair in Population Health
and Addictions, looked at thousands of Nova Scotia secondary school
children during a study that also analyzed 491 documents on the subject.

She called the successful education program "harm minimization" and
found it significantly decreased the risk and negative consequences of
substance use when compared to Nova Scotia senior secondary students
not in the program.

She said the key was serious, active participation by teachers,
principals, school board officials and, of course, students.

"Senior high-school students were . . . able to identify ideas about
how to protect themselves" from such dangerous activities as drinking
and driving and drug overdose or dependency, said Poulin, in Vancouver
on Friday for an international substance-abuse conference at Simon
Fraser University's Harbour Centre.

Poulin also found that harm minimization was not a successful approach
when tested on junior high-school students in the same province --
because the younger students "simply weren't there in terms of
thinking about harm reduction."

As students mature, they are going to increase their risk levels
despite adult expectations to the contrary -- and that necessitates
harm-minimization policies more sophisticated than "just say no," she
said.

"There needs to be a plan B."