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Who's
Who | Fast Facts
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Links
WHO’S
WHO IN PREVENTION ON THE INTERNET:
Our two featured web sites in the field
of Drug Abuse Prevention are The
Center for Substance Abuse Prevention (CSAP) and PREVLINE.
The Center for
Substance Abuse Prevention (CSAP) was created by the Anti-Drug
Abuse Act of 1986 and is the center of the Federal effort to provide
national leadership in the prevention of alcohol, tobacco, and illicit
drug problems. CSAP provides information and assistance to national,
regional, State, and community prevention efforts.
Among its efforts, CSAP established the National Clearinghouse
for Alcohol and Drug Information. The National Clearinghouse
for Alcohol and Drug Information (NCADI) is the world’s largest
resource for current information and materials concerning substance
abuse prevention. NCADI distributes free or low-cost alcohol, tobacco,
and drug materials, including fact sheets, brochures, pamphlets,
monographs, posters, and video tapes from an inventory of over 1,000
items.
PREVLINE,
the website for NCADI, provides one-stop shopping for substance
abuse prevention information on the internet. The site offers electronic
access to searchable databases and substance abuse prevention materials
that pertain to alcohol, tobacco, and other drugs. This site offers
substance abuse resources and referrals, links to research and statistics,
publications, including a list
of publications and materials available through NCADI, and information
about upcoming conferences. There are also links to online forums,
resources and games for kids, and access to hundreds of full-text
files available for downloading to a personal computer. If you’re
not sure where to start or where to find what you’re looking
for, this site is the place to go!
FAST
FACTS:
- Is substance abuse prevention effective in
reducing substance use among youth?
Yes. Findings from a study performed by Cornell University
researchers of students in grades 7-9 in NY State reveal that
the odds of students drinking, smoking and using marijuana were
40% lower when students participated in a school-based substance
abuse prevention program than when they did not.
- Have substance use rates declined
as a result of prevention program efforts?
Yes. According to NCADI (1993), in 1979, 18
percent of all 12- to 17-year olds used illicit drugs and by 1991,
only 7 percent were using illicit drugs.
Also, CSAP reports that between 1979 and 1995, the number of Americans
who had used an illicit drug in the past month decreased nearly
50% (from 25 million in 1979 to 12.8 million in 1995). Most of
these declines are attributed to the implementation of substance
abuse prevention programs. For more information, check out the
SAMHSA
National Household Survey on Drug Abuse for more details.
- What factors contribute to making a prevention program effective?
According to recommendations made by the National Institute on
Drug Abuse, effective prevention programs should be targeted to
more than one group (e.g., focused on the family, school and community
simultaneously), tailored to the needs of each at-risk target
group and designed with input from that group, and occur over
an extended period of time. Check out NIDA’s
on-line prevention publication for more information.
- What are some examples of successful prevention programs?
The Midwestern Prevention Project, a.k.a. Project STAR (Students
Taught Awareness and Resistance) is one example of a successful
prevention program. Project STAR is a universal prevention program
designed for students in grades 7 and 8 which targets the school,
family and community, and includes such components as a mass media
program, a parent program, and school-based curriculum. Results
indicate that students involved in the program reported less use
of alcohol, tobacco and marijuana than students in the control
group. The Life Skills Training Program is a universal school
based program which teaches general personal and social skills
as well as drug resistance skills and normative education. This
program is targeted at middle school children. Extensive study
of this program has indicated that this prevention approach yielded
up to 75% lower levels of tobacco, alcohol and marijuana use,
and that substance use levels remained significantly lower in
youth receiving the intervention (compared to controls) up to
6 years later. For more information about these and other prevention
programs, see http://165.112.78.61/Prevention/PROGRM.html.
- The economic costs of Substance Abuse prevention in the United
States is very difficult to calculate, since funding for prevention
programs comes from both private and government sources. However,
a reasonable estimate of Federal expenditures
for primary prevention is roughly $2.5 billion (NCADI). For every
dollar spent on drug use prevention, communities can save $4-5
in costs for drug abuse treatment and counseling. For more information
on the cost effectiveness of prevention programs, see http://www.health.org/makecase/spend.htm
and http://165.112.78.61/Prevention/PREVPRINC.html.
THE
CUTTING EDGE:
SAMHSA's
National Directory of Drug Abuse and Alcoholism Treatment and Prevention
Programs is available online.
New Prevention Related Materials Available online or through
NCADI:
- Implementing the Synar Regulation: Strategies
for Reducing Sales of Tobacco Products to Minors. CSAP
Technical Report (1998) PHD75
- Cost-Benefit/Cost-Effectiveness Research
of Drug Abuse Prevention: Implications for Programming and Policy.
NIDA Research Monograph 176 (1998) M176
- Let's Help Youth Stay Drug Free, Part
III. Building Healthy Communities: Partnerships and Collaborations
(1998, NCADI) VHS105
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