CLINTON PLAN AIMS TO HALVE DRUG PROBLEM BY 2007

WASHINGTON--Hammering home the need for a strategy that measures success
and failure, the Clinton administration is announcing a fivepart plan
designed to cut the size of the nation's drug problem in half by 2007. In a
threevolume report to Congress, White House drug policy director Barry R.
McCaffrey said drugs cost the country more than 14,000 lives annually,
despite a nationwide effort that includes close to $18 billion spent this
year by the federal government.

President Clinton said that, although "there is some encouraging progress
in the struggle against drugs, . . . the social costs of drug use continue
to climb." In a message to Congress, Clinton said the positive signs
include a growing view among young people that drugs are risky and a
continuing decline in cocaine production abroad.

"Studies demonstrate that when our children understand the dangers of
drugs, their rates of drug use drop," Clinton said.

The five parts of the administration plan are educating children,
decreasing the addicted population, breaking the cycle of drugs and crime,
securing the nation's borders from drugs, and reducing the supply of drugs.
The blend of strategies is aimed at reducing the use and availability of
drugs by 50% by 2007, with 25% by 2002. Achieving the goal would mean just
3% of the U.S. household population ages 12 and over would be using illegal
drugs. The current figure is 6.4%.

In 1979, the rate was near 15%.

Vice President Al Gore said: "This strategy takes us into the next century
with a goal of dramatic reductions in the supply and demand for drugs and a
real chance of giving our children drugfree communities in which to grow
up." With Clinton attending the funeral of Jordan's King Hussein, formal
presentation of the plan today was being handled by Gore and McCaffrey.
Advance copies were made available Sunday. A major piece of the drug
control effort: an advertising campaign that generates more than $195
million a year in matching contributions from media companies. Another
major feature of the strategy is accountability for the wide array of
current antidrug programs, with boosts for those that work and the ability
to identify swiftly and repair those that don't.