PARENTS ARE THE FRONT LINE

A fresh message about drugs, dristributed across the country by two national
agencies, deserves the attention of every parent here on the Central Coast
and every-where else where kids risk their health, their future and their
lives for the thrill of getting high.

The message may have a familiar ring, but the urgency struck us as greater
than ever, even though the principal target is familiar: parents.

"The most effective deterrent to drug use among kids isn't the police, or
prisons, or politicians," says the blunt statement. "One of the most
effective deterrents to drug use among kids is their parents.

You may have heard or read similar words many times before, but not in such
terms as those in this broadside.

The message-it is more a challenge-is the joint effort of the Office of
National Drug Control Policy and the Partnership for a Drug-Free America.

It goes on to say that "kids who learn about the risk of drugs from their
parents are 36 persent less likely to smoke marijuana than kids who learn
nothing from them. They are 50 persent less likely to use inhalants, 56
persent less likely to use cocaine, 65 percent less likely to use LSD."

And ge this: "Research also shows that 74 percent of all fourth-graders wish
their parents would talk to them about drugs."

Are fourth-graders in our area among them? All parents of such youngsters
should ask themselves that question.

The urgency of this campaign makes clear that while drug use may be out of
the news from time to time, it is a constant crisis.

The two agencies estimate that illegal drugs cost America "over $110 billion
each year in treatment, enforcement, incarceration and social damage.

Those billions, we're told, could build 169 hospitals or 687 universities;
could operate 366 national parks, hire 278,481 high school teachers, hire
400,947 more post office clerks or put 75,862 new buses on the road.

We don't know how those statistics were arrived at, given they are so
precise. But even if the arithmetic is a bit skewed, the point is a powerful
one.

The message mat be aimed mostly at parents, but the truth is that the fight
aginst drugs is the responsibility of all of us.