EDITORIAL: FIGHT THE LEGAL DRUG

Harm-reduction is the prevailing strategy to combat use of illegal
intoxicants. Good idea, wrong target. Our priority for harm reduction
strategies should be the improper use of a legal drug.

Last weekend it was the inappropriate use of alcohol that had police
officers chasing down drunks at an otherwise joyful Canada Day celebration.
It was an apparent alcohol overdose of a friend that frightened a young man
to flee the consequences, and we don't know yet if the end will be
redemptive or tragic.

For many years, from the middle of June to the middle of July,
almost-adults wrapped their cars around trees, testing their mortality with
an enthusiasm fuelled by liquor.

These deaths are, thankfully, rarer because of a long and earnest campaign
to convince most young people that drinking and driving is not heroic.

The campaign did not address entirely the drinking habits of youth. Too
many kids are still pounding back 26-ounce bottles of hard liquor,
oblivious to the fact that the stuff is lethal in large quantities, but
feeling secure because they're not driving.

There is no consensus on appropriate drinking among adults, let alone
minors, and the ambiguity is one reason youth don't understand the
difference between sipping a cooler on the porch or taking vodka into the bush.

When there is no consensus, kids sense that there is no right or wrong and
allow peers to make the call. Harm reduction strategies do not require
consensus to be effective -- in fact, with illegal drugs, work against it.
What the strategies do is try to stop bad situations from getting worse and
what we have with kids and alcohol is a situation that isn't getting better.