DARE HAS ITS PLACE

Was Marcus Rummery s letter intended to be some kind of a joke? Was he
really intending to suggest that drug education programs functioned as
little better than how-to programs for children? I would have to beg to differ.

As a former teacher, I know that children are experimenting with drugs at a
younger and younger age. I also know that when these children are exposed
to individuals who can tell them first-hand about the consequences of drug
abuse, it makes students reconsider. Take as an example Jude Bell, a young
man from Vancouver who is now permanently paralyzed, blind, deaf and mute
as a result of the strokes he suffered from heroin abuse before his 21st
birthday. He moves high school students who hear him speak with the aid of
a computerized voice box to tears. Tell me they are more likely to try
drugs than their peers who don't hear him speak, Mr. Rummery.

It is also true that there is a scandalous lack of treatment facilities in
this province. But to suggest that the solution is universal drug testing
via hair samples? Again I have to ask if this is a joke? I am reminded of
the episode of Seinfeld, where one character is denied a trip to Africa
because of a false positive drug test from a poppy seed bagel. Entire lives
might be ruined from false tests, or from past history despite many years
lived clean and sober.

Finally, I would suggest that if Mr. Rummery wants to live in a country
where the possibility of a random drug test for any given person on any
given day for no particular reason lurks right around the corner, he pack
his bags and head south to the home of the free and the land of the frightened.

By Heather Sparrow, Parksville