CHILEAN GOVERNMENT TARGETS MARIJUANA IN ANTI-DRUG EFFORTS

Would you believe possible side effects of smoking marijuana include
memory loss, addiction, and an inability to differentiate between an oven
and an icebox? That's what the Chilean government's new anti-drug
commercials say.

With the aim of preventing adolescents from doing drugs, the National
Council for Narcotics Control (CONACE) launched the new campaign Monday.
The campaign, "Return to Being Smart," began because the government grew
worried over findings that suggest kids do not think there are risks
involved in smoking marijuana.

The name, said CONACE Prevention Director Decio Mettifogo, "comes from
marijuana's effects being temporary rather than permanent, thus the word
'return.'"

The commercials are demonstrations from "a manual for people under the
influence of marijuana" and show simple situations, like tying one's shoes
and finding where to put ice. In the commercials, an adolescent has great
difficulty performing these tasks, supposedly mimicking the diminished
faculties of those under the influence of marijuana.

"The goal," Mettifogo told The Santiago Times, "is not to say that
marijuana is a horrible thing but that it is not harmless."

The campaign will last 45 days and use TV commercials and radio spots to
bring the message to the nation. Officials will also distribute
informational materials throughout the country.

According to the Seventh National Study of Youth Drug Use and Perception,
16 percent of Chilean students between 8th grade and 12th grade said they
had used marijuana in the last year, and only four out of 10 thought
frequent use of the drug is harmful.

"(Marijuana) is very common . . . but at school, there have been lots of
campaigns about the negative effects of marijuana," 16-year-old Constanza
Vidal told The Santiago Times. She added that she thinks the campaigns
have had the opposite effect from what was intended and brought more
attention to the drug.

Twenty-four percent of Chilean high school seniors reported having used
marijuana within the last month, while only five percent of 8th graders
said they had.

This is significantly lower than in the United States, where the 2007
Monitoring the Future Study reported that almost 38 percent of seniors had
used marijuana in the past year.

CONACE Executive Secretary Maria Teresa Chadwick explained, "The campaign
is directed at families, especially those that have adolescent children,
so they can talk together about the effects of marijuana. We are talking
about a drug that is addictive."

Chadwick added, "It's worrying that adolescents in our country believe
that marijuana isn't harmful. They are aware of the dangers of alcohol and
tobacco; but the perception of risk associated with marijuana use has
diminished in recent years, because natural things are promoted as
innocuous - despite scientific evidence showing marijuana is not
harmless."

Vanessa Carrasco, 26, agrees that people don't see marijuana as dangerous.
"I think the majority of people near my age have tried marijuana at least
once," she told The Santiago Times. "So, at least in urban society,
marijuana use isn't looked at as anything more than people experimenting
when they're young. . . . People don't really keep consuming it. It's more
of a dumb thing you do when you're young. . . . I've never tried it, and
it doesn't interest me . . . but, if someone else considers it good, it's
not my business. "

CONACE also sponsored a recent day of talks on the "neurobiology of drug
addiction," held in conjunction with academics from Chile's Universidad
Catolica. Two hundred 11th-grade students attended.