DRIVING UNDER ANOTHER INFLUENCE: POT

For more than two decades, the message has been as deafening as an
ambulance siren: Don't drink and drive.

With prom season under way and graduation parties next, schools have
shifted into high gear. Mock accidents. Breathalyzer screens. Mothers
Against Drunk Driving assemblies.

But experts say not enough attention is being paid to another risky
behavior: driving under the influence of drugs such as marijuana.
Known as "drugging and driving," it is nearly as prevalent as
drinking and driving, researchers say.

In March, 16-year-old Jessica Easter of Bala Cynwyd, Pa., was killed
as she tried to get out of an SUV driven by Stephen L. Meloni, 19, a
Harriton High School graduate who had twice the legal amount of
alcohol in his system. Meloni also tested positive for marijuana. In
addition, police found nearly 80 grams of the drug in his vehicle.

In Bucks County, a 19-year-old died last year after crashing into a
tree near Oxford Valley Mall. He was under the influence of
marijuana, police said.

"Kids just don't see it as all that risky," said Stephen Wallace,
national head of Students Against Destructive Decisions, a peer
advocacy group based in Marlborough, Mass.

"We've done a great job of educating young people and parents about
the dangers of drinking and driving," Wallace said. "We need to ramp
up our efforts on drugging and driving."

Though SADD and law enforcement agencies believe, without a doubt,
that driving while drugged contributes to accidents, it is a "phantom
menace," Wallace said.

Data collection has begun only recently and it is often incomplete.

In 2004, at least 9 percent of roughly 17,100 drivers tested for
drugs after being involved in a fatal crash came up positive for
marijuana, according to statistics provided by the National Highway
Traffic Safety Adminstration.

But many drug test results go unreported, and testing methodology is
not uniform. Researchers also say people may register positive for
marijuana use up to two weeks after using the drug.

Furthermore, drivers who are found to be intoxicated are rarely given
a second test for the presence of drugs. As a result, those who are
multiply impaired can go undetected.

Unlike most drugs, evidence of marijuana use lingers in the body. It
takes eight days to eliminate 90 percent of it, according to a study
cited by Wilkie Wilson, professor of pharmacology at Duke University
and co-author of Buzzed: The Straight Facts about the Most Used and
Abused Drugs from Alcohol to Ecstasy.

Researchers say that marijuana, which has become more potent over the
years, affects judgment, concentration, perception, coordination and
reaction time - all skills needed for safe driving. The greatest risk
is in the first 24 hours.

"If you're smoking marijuana, you have no business driving," Wilson said.

In 2003, members of NAIVE (Narcotic, Alcohol, Inhalant & Violence
Education) began visiting schools, said founder Dan Baranoski, a
Middletown Police Department detective. During presentations, he
said, the group drums the message about drugging and driving. "When
the topic of pot comes up," he said, "half of (the students) cheer. .
. . They think it's not that bad."

Conventional wisdom among teens "is that kids can drive after smoking
marijuana, that they have a little more control" than they do after
drinking, said Patrick O'Malley, a research professor at the
University of Michigan, who is involved in the "Monitoring the
Future" survey of U.S. high school students.

In 2004, O'Malley said that 13 percent of seniors reported driving
after drinking. The same percentage acknowledged driving after
smoking marijuana.

In a study of injured drivers at a Baltimore trauma unit, conducted
in 2003, marijuana was the most popular companion drug to alcohol,
especially among those under 35, said psychologist J. Michael Walsh,
president of the Walsh Group, a Bethesda, Md., consultancy involved
in the research.

That finding is worrisome, Walsh said, because marijuana combined
with a beer or two can produce a blood-alcohol level nearly twice the
legal limit in many states. It's more than seven times Pennsylvania's
limit for drivers under 21.

The study concluded that driver-safety initiatives that focus solely
on alcohol overlook the role of drugs in a "significant proportion" of crashes.

That has started to change. A "Steer Clear of Pot" campaign,
sponsored by the Office of National Drug Control, was launched in
December 2004.

States have also been encouraged to test drivers in accidents for
drug use. That is still rarely done, largely because there is no
Breathalyzer equivalent for roadside drug testing.

Others are lobbying to make it a crime to have any level of an
illegal drug in one's system while driving. Only 13 states, including
Pennsylvania, have such a law.

Groups such as the National Organization for the Reform of Marijuana
Laws (NORML), which lobbies for legalization of the drug, are
concerned that campaigns focused on drugged driving may be linked to
efforts to further criminalize pot. NORRL urges members not to drive
impaired, said Allen St. Pierre, the group's executive director.

In many schools, warnings about drugging and driving are infrequent.

"In my 10 years of school," said junior Andrew Karasik, president of
the SADD chapter at Lower Merion High School, "I've heard about the
riskiness of smoking marijuana and getting behind the wheel once or
twice compared to drinking and driving, which you hear every year."

Bob Lenahan, a driver-ed teacher at Methacton High School, has
updated his message. He uses goggles and driving simulators to show
the effect of drugs. "They're real quiet afterwards," he said of his students.

Cruisin' Not Boozin', a program of Bryn Mawr Rehab Hospital, is
making the rounds of local schools, having patients who suffered
serious injuries in accidents involving alcohol and drugs speak to students.

Yet many area school administrators say that in spring, full
schedules leave little time for discussions about the danger of
driving while drugged.

"Alcohol, without question, is the most abused drug in America. I
don't think it's wrong to emphasize that message," said Joe
Bollendorf, an assistant principal at Washington Township High School
in Gloucester County. He said drugs get addressed other times of the year.

A wrecked car will be parked in front of the school to send the
message "Don't Drink and Drive." On prom day, Friday, Washington
Township's seniors will hear from a prosecutor, a trauma nurse and a
mother with Mothers Against Drunk Driving who lost her daughter to a
drunk driver.

"Many kids become visibly unhinged," Bollendorf said. "They're going
to think twice."

Lower Merion tackles impaired driving in a variety of ways. Last
month, prom-goers underwent Breathalyzer tests.

Marijuana, methamphetamines, alcohol - there's so much students need
to be educated about, said Bruce Barner, the district's supervisor of
guidance. "We need to be able to say these are all dangerous," Barner said.