NCJ Number
223787
Journal
Law Enforcement Technology Volume: 35 Issue: 7 Dated: July 2008 Pages: 86,88-90,92,93
Date Published
July 2008
Length
6 pages
Annotation
This article discusses the pharmaceutical drug phenomenon and the factors that have lead to today’s adolescent prescription drug misuse and abuse epidemic.
Abstract
Addiction treatment professionals and law enforcement have watched the prescription drug abuse and misuse trend hold steady with adolescents since it was first aggressively addressed in 2006 by the Partnership for a Drug-Free America and the White House Office of National Drug Control Policy. Experts warn that drug and technology savvy adolescents are becoming their own pharmacists, demonstrated by a relatively new and disturbing social event, “pharm parties.” These parties are where adolescents bring prescription drugs, taken from family or friends’ medicine cabinets and mix them together in a bowl and pop a pill cocktail and sometimes wash it down with alcohol. Education is seen as the key to addressing the problem. Treatment is seen as an ineffective solution to teen drug addiction alone. It is believed that speaking to groups of students and presenting the problem and the consequences is the best way to tackle the stability of prescription drug abuse with today’s adolescents.