GATEWAY THEORY ON DRUGS IS IN QUESTION

"Meth Among Us, part three: The best weapon against meth? You!"(Dec. 4),
contained a comment by Burnett County Sheriff Tim Curtin: "What D.A.R.E.
teaches is alcohol, tobacco and marijuana are gateway drugs. They open the
door to other, more serious drugs."

The so-called "gateway theory" has been questioned for years. The Institute
of Medicine report on marijuana, commissioned by ex-drug czar Barry
McCaffrey and released in 1999, found it very dubious, and interestingly
enough, the RAND Corporation just released a study concluding that
marijuana use does not lead to experimentation with harder drugs, instead
finding that teens begin using marijuana, simply because it is the most
available substance.

The RAND study also questions whether drug control efforts should be so
focused on marijuana.

Our youth would be better served by being given fact-based education about
the relative safety of substances they are likely to come across in life
rather than subjected to outdated and inaccurate information and
fear-mongering from the D.A.R.E. program.

For example, children and adults suffering Attention Deficit Disorder are
often prescribed a form of methamphetamine called Adderall. The only
difference between meth and Adderall is [that] one is made in a
pharmaceutical factory and the other in a meth lab. Now, if meth is the
monster it is portrayed as, why are children as young as five being
prescribed the pharmaceutical form?

It's inconsistencies like these that illustrate why America's war on drugs
is a miserable failure. Society would be much better off if we began
treating substance use and abuse as a public health matter rather one of
criminal justice.

A good start would be to decriminalize and regulate marijuana like we do
alcohol and tobacco. Regulation helps keep these substances out of the
hands of children.

We wouldn't think of caging humans for smoking a cigarette or having a
drink in their own home. Why sh`ould marijuana be any different?

Gary Storck Madison WI