SCOURGE OF CHILDREN AND DRUGS

Action Must Be Taken to Protect Young People

GLASGOW can be a world beater when it comes to shocking statistics.
Another set arrived yesterday, this time on the extent of drug use
among children. In a study of 10-12-year-olds in Glasgow and
Newcastle, researchers found that 30% had been exposed to illegal
drugs; 5% of pre-teens in Glasgow had used them (2.7% in Newcastle);
and though the drug most widely used was cannabis, it was estimated
that 60 children will have used heroin. Even allowing for a margin of
error and exaggeration on the part of youngsters who took part, it is
a deeply disturbing picture.

The Glasgow University study, involving 2318 children, was
commissioned after the death of a 13-year-old from a heroin overdose
in Glasgow in 1998. Researchers found that children were more likely
to use drugs if they were a certain age (12) and gender (boys), if
they came from a deprived background, had someone in the family who
used drugs, or had parents who exercised little supervision. It is a
toxic mixture of chance and circumstance.

As one of the professors who conducted the study said, there is no
such thing as recreational drug use when it comes to children. Those
who take drugs are damaging their emotional and physical well-being
and playing a deadly game that some will not survive. That some
children have been exposed to drugs is a tragedy for the individuals
concerned and their families, but it should also concern other
parents. If one child is bold enough to experiment, then the risk is
other youngsters, in the playground or on the street corner, will be
dragged in. Society as a whole stands to be harmed, and be forced to
pay a high price in crime and many other costs, if children do not
learn the right lessons about drugs early enough.

Education is the key, but it has to be tailored in the right way, at
the right time. The child who is merely curious will have different
needs from the one who has gone that one step further. Intervention,
and support for parents and carers, is essential. Yet the fear is that
in a city already struggling to recruit enough social workers to cope
with alcohol and drug abuse among adults, children will be forced to
take their place at the back of a very long queue. That is
unacceptable. Glasgow has for too long allowed one generation's
problems to poison the life chances of the next. It happened with
alcohol; that it should occur with drugs as well is a proposition to
which we should all just say no.