400,000 SECONDARY SCHOOL STUDENTS 'USING DRUGS'

Nairobi

The number of girl students addicted to drugs in secondary schools
yesterday shocked the head teachers' conference in Mombasa.

Delivering a keynote speech on drug abuse among students in the country, a
surgeon, Prof Peter Odhiambo, said there are 400,000 students who are drug
addicts in secondary schools.

He said the number of girls abusing drugs is growing at an alarming rate
and could soon surpass that of boys.

Odhiambo is associated with National Agency on the Campaign Against Drug
Abuse (Nacada) and a leading campaigner against tobacco use.

"Out of this number, 16,000 are girls and the rest boys. However, of
significance to this is that the number of girls entering into this bracket
is alarming and will soon be 50 to 50 to that of boys," he said.

Odhiambo said a new drug known as "Kuber" which is a mixture of tobacco and
bhang has gained overwhelming popularity among students.

"This drug is taken in the form of cigarette," he said, adding that
cannabis sativa and other forms of tobacco are also popular.

He told the 3,500 heads who are attending the Kenya Secondary Schools Heads
Association (KSSHA) annual conference at Aga Khan Sports Centre, in
Mombasa, the education sector was under threat of drug abuse.

Presentations on drugs dominated the summit since it started on Monday with
Nacada National Co-ordinator, Mr Joseph Kaguthi, leading the team.

Odhiambo said school-age generation faces a bleak future due to rampant
abuse of hard drugs.

Students had a wrong belief that when they take drugs or smoked, their
performance would be enhanced, he said. "With every cigarette smoked, 10
per cent of the mental capability slows down," he said.

"Smoking and drug taking only increases euphoria which leads to students
believing they are better off. But this is totally wrong," he said.

He said drugs affect brain nerves, slow down its activity resulting in slow
and blurred concentration to the user. This worsens with subsequent taking
of more doses.

Drugs are classified as poison by experts and continued usage could result
in eventual death.

He said drug taking students' end up becoming highway gangsters and hard
core criminals in their adult life.

During question time, teachers said their science colleagues usually smoke
more and take other drugs, which influenced their students.

However, Odhiambo said it has not been established whether science teachers
smoke more than their colleagues in other subjects.

Students go into drugs due to peer influence and copy adults who are either
parents, teachers or role models.

And Odhiambo called for speedy enactment of the National Tobacco Bill to
provide for necessary legislation for the campaign against smoking.

He said proper national legislation and eventual ratification of relevant
international conventions was needed to intensify the campaign against
tobacco consumption.

Kaguthi urged head teachers to put more effective strategies in managing
their schools to reduce drug abuse among students.

"If everybody in society talked freely about drug abuse, this would lessen
the magnitude of the problem," he said.

Kaguthi said corruption had worsened the crisis saying security agents and
the Judiciary were frequently compromised by dealers.

"Corruption is the grease of drug industry," he said and warned that Coast
region was the hardest hit. "This war is tough because the drug industry is
highly paying despite being highly illegal," he said.

And Kaguthi said Nacada had allocated Sh1.8 million to secondary schools.
Some of the money will be used in training of special counsellors on drug
abuse.

"The counsellors will be posted to schools to counter the increasing number
of students using drugs," he said.

Kenya, he added, was among the leading nations in the use of synthetic
drugs such as bhang, alcohol and cigarettes.

He said traffickers were targeting those aged between 15 to 21 years old
who are mainly secondary school students. "Every year, barons get Sh400
million from drugs sold in the country," he said.

He told the heads drug barons were using students to traffic drugs and the
trend was evident in the number of parties held in residential areas during
holidays.

Kaguthi said barons were also using funeral convoys to ferry drugs from one
part of the country to another without being noticed by officers manning
road-blocks.

A leading psychiatrist, Dr Samwel Gatere, blamed parents who had left the
upbringing of their children to maids.

"You reap what you sow and that is why most children left in the hands of
maids start abusing drugs at an early age," he said.