SOME OF THE THINGS YOU CAN DO ABOUT DRUG ABUSE

• BECOME INFORMED. Learn about the drug problem in your area. Check with local officials to find out what the trends are. Ask school officials what they are doing to prevent drug abuse and whether they teach about it in health or other classes. Ask your own children whether they think there is a problem. You might be surprised at how much knowledge they have.
  
  
• GET INVOLVED. Volunteer your services to groups such as Red Ribbon campaigns and various youth groups. Find out what your church or civic club is doing about the problem. Consider organizing a “Drug Fair” where anti-drug groups are brought together, community leaders speak out, and students perform skits and use other talents to show: “You lose with drug abuse”
  
  
• MAINTAIN A POSITIVE ATTITUDE. Note that every problem has a solution, and if one is a drug user he or she can bring it to a halt. They must do so for their own well-being and to avoid setting a bad example for others, including younger brothers and sisters.
  
  
• CONTRIBUTE FUNDS. Most grass-roots prevention groups are operated by volunteers who need funds from private and business donors. They need help to cover the overhead and can’t get far without it. Most have non-profit status, making the donations tax-deductible. Often students, with proper supervision, conduct fund raising projects to help.
  
  
• BECOME A VOICE TO BE HEARD. Let leaders at all levels, from school principals to the White House, know we MUST bring drug abuse to an absolute minimum. Tell them we can’t stand by while children are facing dangers from overdoses and accidents, while many go through life with no ambition and poor health, sapping resources of their families and others who eventually pay the enormous cost of this needless, useless, self-inflected wound. Our children and grandchildren deserve a better environment than this.