Publications

Addiction Prevention and Treatment News
(10.26.2007)

1. Drug War Chronicle: Feature: San Francisco Ponders a Safe Injection Site, Would Be the Nation's First

2. USA Today: Anti-drug aid package would give Mexico air-power boost

3. Associated Press: Bill calls for equalizing penalties for crack, powder cocaine

4. New York Times: Rational Sentencing (Editorial)

5. Boston Globe: Study links teen smoking, drinking - Younger they start, the higher the risk

6. Los Angeles Times: Bush seeks Mexico drug war money; He asks Congress for $1.4 billion. It would be the largest U.S. aid package to Latin America since 2000.

7. Newsday: An epidemic of Teen Drinking; What can parents do about rising alcohol use among middle- and high-school kids? 8. New York Times: Bush Asks Congress for $1.4 Billion to Fight Drugs in Mexico

9. Washington Post: Bush Seeking Aid for Mexico In Drug Fight

10. USA Today: White House pledges $1.4B for Mexico drug war

11. Inside Bay Area: Europe's take on its drug problem (Opinion).

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1. Drug War Chronicle
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October 29, 2007

http://stopthedrugwar.org/chronicle/507/san_francisco_ponders_safe_injection_site

HEADLINE: Feature: San Francisco Ponders a Safe Injection Site, Would Be the Nation's First

San Francisco city officials last Thursday took a tentative first step toward opening the nation's first safe injection site for drug users. In an effort to reduce the city's high number of fatal drug overdoses, as well as slow the spread of blood-borne infectious diseases, such as HIV and Hepatitis C, the city's public health department teamed up with a coalition of health and social service nonprofit groups to present a daylong forum on safe injection sites, how they work, and how they can be established.

O'Farrell St., Tenderloin district, SF (courtesy Wikimedia)San Francisco's needle-using population is estimated at between 11,000 and 15,000, with many of them being homeless men. While injection-related HIV rates are relatively low, Hepatitis C is spreading quickly among drug users. About 40 San Franciscans die from drug overdoses each year. Injection drug use is also a quality of life issue for businesses and residents in areas of the city like the Tenderloin, where public injecting is not rare and dirty needles can be found on the streets. The neighborhood, a center of services for down and out residents, is often mentioned as a potential location for a safe injection site.

Safe injection sites are up and running in some 27 cities in eight European countries, as well as Australia and Canada. They have been shown to reduce overdoses, needle-sharing, and the spread of disease, as well as entice some users into drug treatment -- all without causing increased drug use, crime or other social disorder.

The symposium was cosponsored by the Harm Reduction Coalition, the Drug Policy Alliance, and the San Francisco AIDS Foundation, and was organized by a local consortium of community-based groups known as the Alliance for Saving Lives. That broad-based umbrella group includes public health officials, service providers, legal experts, injection drug users, and researchers.

"Having the conversation today will help us figure out whether this is a way to reduce the harms and improve the health of our community," said Grant Colfax, director of HIV prevention for the San Francisco Department of Public Health.

Vancouver's Insite safe injection site, the only one in North America, was held up as a model for a potential similar program in San Francisco. Both Dr. Thomas Kerr of the British Columbia Center on Excellence in AIDS, who has evaluated InSite, and the facility's program manager, Sarah Evans, addressed the forum about their experiences.

Evans described the Downtown Eastside Vancouver facility as a bland place where drug users can come in and inject in a safe, sterile environment under medical supervision, then relax in a "chill out" room where they are observed. "It looks kind of like a hair salon," Evans said of the bustling space. "If we were a restaurant, we would be making a profit."

While InSite has seen some 800 drug overdoses, said Kerr, none of them had been fatal because of the medical supervision available at the site. His research has found increases in addicts seeking treatment and decreases in abandoned syringes, needle-sharing, drug-related crime and other problems since the clinic opened three years ago, he said. Those findings suggest it is worth doing elsewhere, despite the criticism it will attract, Kerr said.

But while the science appears to be on the side of such facilities, political reality is a different matter. San Francisco Mayor Gavin Newsome's office has said that he does not support safe injection sites, and by this week, even public health department spokesmen were keeping mum. "We're not talking to the media at all any more," Colfax said on Tuesday in response to inquiries about what comes next.

While there has been community concern, the only vocal reaction has been coming from Washington, DC, where one senator, Republican James DeMint (SC), has introduced an amendment that would cut off federal health funds for any locality that starts a safe injection site, and where the Office of National Drug Control Policy (ONDCP) has attacked the idea via the press and its Pushing Back blog.

Bertha Madras, ONDCP deputy director of demand reduction, told the Associated Press the fact that the idea was even being discussed was "disconcerting" and "poor public policy." According to Madras, "The underlying philosophy is 'We accept drug addiction, we accept the state of affairs as acceptable.' This is a form of giving up."

But Hilary McQuie, Western Director for the Harm Reduction Coalition, and one of the guiding forces behind the push for a safe injection site in San Francisco, pronounced herself unworried about either DC opponent. "DeMint's measure is a rash overreaction that won't go anywhere," she predicted, "and as for ONDCP, well, I won't even debate them. It's none of their business; this is a local issue, not a national one."

It's a local issue that McQuie and others have been working patiently on for some time now. "We initiated the Alliance for Saving Lives about a year ago," she explained. "It's mostly agencies that work with drug users, and we've been meeting monthly. We've had some quiet conversations with the health department, and we decided it was time to take the next step."

Now it's time for advocates to build more community support for a safe injection site, including bringing the mayor and the Board of Supervisors on board. Even with science on their side, they have some work ahead of them.

"We know the issues and the science," said Randy Shaw, a long-time community activist working on homeless issues in the Tenderloin, "but no one here wants more of these kinds of facilities." "Why should the poor people of the Tenderloin have to live with all these problems? There are junkies in Golden Gate Park, there are junkies in SOMA, there's more drug traffic at the 16th Street BART station than anywhere in the Tenderloin," he said. "If some neighborhood wants to accept it, that's fine, we just don't want it in the Tenderloin."

City officials have made the neighborhood "a containment zone," Shaw complained. "We already have methadone clinics, needle exchanges, food programs, shelters, drug treatment programs. Now they don't even think about putting things in other neighborhoods." Some activists want to turn the Tenderloin into Hamsterdam, the industrial neighborhood turned into a drug trafficking free zone in the HBO show The Wire, Shaw said. "But we're a residential neighborhood."

"It's controversial," conceded Tenderloin Economic Development Project executive director Julian Davis, a supporter of the idea. "Some folks think the Tenderloin already has too high a concentration of these kinds of services, while others think like this sort of facility would enable drug users as opposed to ending drug addiction in the Tenderloin."

But Davis has a different perspective. "I look at the Tenderloin and I see that our city, our society is already enabling open drug use and drug dealing," he argued. "The idea behind the site is to get some of these users off the street and inside, where they can get access to services, and also to stop the needle-sharing and the spreading of HIV and Hep C. I see quite a few potential benefits from this."

And so the public discussion begins in San Francisco. It will be a long and twisting path between here and an actually existing safe injection site, with much work to be done at the neighborhood, municipal, state, and federal levels. It could take years, but advocates are confident its day will come.

"I think we will have a safe injection site eventually," McQuie predicted, "but how long that will take depends on how well we organize, who's in power, and how much pressure those in power locally feel from the feds."

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2. USA Today
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October 26, 2007

HEADLINE: Anti-drug aid package would give Mexico air-power boost

BYLINE: Chris Hawley

MEXICO CITY -- Nearly half of a new $500 million U.S. aid package for Mexico would be used to purchase surveillance planes and helicopters so that Mexican police can track drug traffickers who are often better armed and operating faster vehicles than they are.

The aircraft would help the Mexican government build on its recent success in cracking down on drug cartels, Thomas Shannon, the State Department's top diplomat for Latin America, said Thursday in a telephone interview.

The $500 million, which has not yet been approved by Congress, is the first phase of a $1.4 billion anti-drug package that would be distributed in the next three years. The surveillance aircraft would help Mexican agents chase down the planes and speedboats that carry cocaine from South America to remote areas of Mexico, where it is then taken to the U.S. border.

The U.S. government has credited Mexican President Felipe Calderon's aggressive anti-drug tactics with a reduction in cocaine supply in several U.S. cities. However, the crash last month of a U.S.-registered business jet carrying 3.2 tons of cocaine in Mexico's Yucatan Peninsula shows drug planes are still slipping into Mexico.

About $208 million of the first wave of money would go toward eight Bell 412 transport helicopters and two CASA CN-235 surveillance planes, Shannon said. He said the aircraft would be new, avoiding a repeat of the 1990s, when the United States donated more than 70 Vietnam War-era Huey helicopters to Mexico. The helicopters were so expensive to maintain that Mexico eventually returned most of them.

"We're not going to do that again," Shannon said.

The Bell 412 is a more modern version of the Huey. The Spanish-built CASA CN-235s are twin-engine turboprops that can fly at 280 mph and land on short airstrips.

The U.S. Coast Guard flies a very similar plane, raising the possibility of joint anti-drug missions in the future, Shannon said.

An additional $100 million in the first wave of U.S. aid would go toward making Mexico's law enforcement system more effective, including classes and equipment to help conduct investigations, perform forensic tests, manage prisons and prepare court cases, Shannon said.

Another large share of the money would go toward X-ray machines, ion scanners and other devices for searching cargo, he said.

The package also calls for a major increase in U.S.-led training programs, although U.S. officials have stressed that U.S. forces will not be going on missions with Mexican soldiers or police, and the number of U.S. personnel operating in Mexico will not increase.

A small part of the $500 million would go toward weapons, Shannon said. He declined to elaborate. Mexican police complain they are increasingly outgunned by drug smugglers who buy assault-style rifles, grenade launchers and hand grenades in the USA.

Some experts in Mexico worry that increased military activity will lead to more drug-related violence. "I don't think (the aid) is going to stop the violence in Mexico. It's going to exacerbate it, raise the cost of drugs and worsen things," said Miguel Sarre, a criminal justice professor at the Autonomous Technological Institute of Mexico.

Hawley is Latin America correspondent for USA TODAY and The Arizona Republic

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3. Associated Press
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October 25, 2007

HEADLINE: Bill calls for equalizing penalties for crack, powder cocaine

DATELINE: Columbus, Ohio

Legislation that would bring penalties for offenses involving powder cocaine in line with those involving crack cocaine could backfire and lead to greater prison populations, an association of defense attorneys said.

A bill that passed the state Senate with unanimous support Tuesday imposes stiffer penalties for possession and trafficking of powder cocaine, bringing sentencing guidelines to the same level as those involving crack cocaine.

The original penalties imposed on offenders with crack cocaine were racially discriminatory, said state Sen. Ray Miller, the bill's sponsor. The use of crack cocaine is largely based in poor and minority areas, and powder cocaine users are often white, he said.

The bill's passage came because lawmakers now have a broader understanding that drug problems in Ohio extend beyond city street corners, Miller said.

"We've got a growing problem in our rural areas of the state, and many of these members are well aware of the problem," said Miller, a Columbus Democrat. The bill now goes to the House, which, like the Senate, is controlled by Republicans.

The bill will be reviewed in the House, but it's too early to say if there's enough support to pass it, said Karen Tabor, a spokeswoman for Speaker Jon Husted.

Ohio is one of about 12 states that has disparities in sentencing for crack and powder cocaine, said Allison Lawrence, a policy associate with the National Conference of State Legislatures.

Under current Ohio law, penalties for crack cocaine are far harsher than those for powder cocaine. For example, a person caught with only 25 grams of crack can be convicted of a first-degree felony, while it requires at least 500 grams of powder cocaine to face the same sanctions.

The Ohio Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers supported equalizing the penalties, but wanted the penalties for crack cocaine reduced to match penalties for powder cocaine, said Barry Wilford, the group's legislative director.

"I still think, ironically, the federal government is still struggling with the same issue, although I think they are still advancing an approach to reduce the penalties for crack cocaine," he said.

He said that signals that the Ohio legislature's move is out of step with what the federal government has considered, Wilford said.

State Sen. Bill Seitz, a Cincinnati Republican, voted for the bill but expressed concern because an analysis indicated it would cost $25 million or more per year to house new offenders convicted under the harsher penalties.

"That's real money," he said. "And that's what happens when we equalize penalties at a higher rate."

Miller said he doesn't necessarily agree because the penalties will encourage more judges to opt for treatment programs instead of prison for offenders, an assertion Wilford disputed.

"It seems to me when you lengthen the prison penalties for an offense you're not sending a strong signal to judges that they can use some non-prison alternatives to look at the case," he said.

The Ohio Prosecuting Attorneys Association supported the bill, although increased penalties would probably boost prison rolls, executive director John Murphy said.

Past penalties differed because legislators and law enforcement officials considered that crack is deemed more addictive than powder cocaine.

"The legislature decided that was not a sufficient reason to maintain the difference (in punishment) and that's fine with us, too," Murphy said.

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4. New York Times
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October 25, 2007

HEADLINE: Rational Sentencing (Editorial)

New York sparked a disastrous national trend during the 1970s with laws that often penalized first-time drug felons more severely than rapists or murderers. Imitated throughout the country, New York's so-called Rockefeller laws drove up the prison population tenfold and cost the states a fortune, but did nothing to curb the drug trade. Worse still, they tied the hands of judges -- and destroyed countless young lives -- by requiring long prison terms in cases where leniency and drug treatment were clearly warranted.

New York has made incremental changes to the Rockefeller laws in recent years, but has stopped short of restoring judicial discretion. Gov. Eliot Spitzer seemed to be pushing in that direction this year when he appointed a commission to study the range of state sentencing practices.

The commission's preliminary report contains many valuable recommendations for fixing the sentencing system as a whole. But the superficial treatment given the Rockefeller laws has raised fears among fair- sentencing advocates that the commission intends to duck the issue in its final report, due next spring. That cannot be allowed to happen. Voters deserve a thorough airing of this issue and a full menu of options for reforming the most draconian drug laws the country has yet seen.

The report rightly calls for ending New York's byzantine system of ''indeterminate sentencing,'' under which a judge imposes a minimum and a maximum sentence and the Parole Board decides when to release an offender. It calls for sentencing certain nonviolent offenders to community-based treatment instead of prison. It also recommends restoring prison-based educational and training programs, which have been shown to cut recidivism by giving inmates marketable skills.

Most important, the report calls for the state to establish a permanent, independent sentencing commission to advise legislators. Already working in several states, such commissions have independence and statutory authority. At their best, they help legislatures make rational decisions and avoid disastrous policies that have failed elsewhere, like New York.

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5. Boston Globe
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October 24, 2007

HEADLINE: Study links teen smoking, drinking - Younger they start, the higher the risk

BYLINE: Will Dunham; Reuters

Washington - Teenagers who smoke are five times more likely to drink and 13 times more likely to use marijuana, according to a report issued yesterday.

The report by Columbia University's National Center on Addiction and Substance Abuse presented further evidence linking youth smoking to other substance abuse and spotlighted research on how nicotine affects the adolescent brain.

"Teenage smoking can signal the fire of alcohol and drug abuse or mental illness like depression and anxiety," Joseph Califano, who heads the center and is a former US health secretary, said in a telephone interview.

The report analyzed surveys conducted by the US Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration and other data on youth smokers. Most smokers begin smoking before age 18.

Smokers ages 12 to 17 are more likely to drink alcohol than nonsmokers - 59 percent compared with 11 percent, the report found.

The younger a child is when he or she starts smoking, the greater the risk, the Columbia team said.

Children who start smoking by age 12 are also more than three times more likely than nonsmokers to binge on alcohol, nearly 15 times more likely to smoke marijuana, and almost seven times more likely to use other drugs such as heroin and cocaine.

Binge drinking was defined as having five drinks or more in a row.

Asked whether smoking is causing these other behaviors or is just another risky behavior occurring alongside the others, Califano said, "There's no question that early teenage smoking is linked to these other things. Now whether it's causing it or not, I think the jury is probably still out on that."

Smokers ages 12 to 17 are more apt to meet the diagnostic definition for drug abuse or dependence in the previous year - 26 percent compared with 2 percent, the researchers said.

The report noted that marijuana is the most widely used illicit drug among teenagers, with government data from 2005 showing 7 percent of those ages 12 to 17 used marijuana.

Teenagers who smoke also have a higher risk of depression and anxiety disorders, the study found.

The report cited scientific studies showing the nicotine in tobacco products can produce structural and chemical changes in the developing brain that make young people vulnerable to alcohol and other drug addiction and mental illness.

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6. Los Angeles Times
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October 23, 2007 HEADLINE: Bush seeks Mexico drug war money; He asks Congress for $1.4 billion. It would be the largest U.S. aid package to Latin America since 2000.

BYLINE: Hector Tobar

DATELINE: Mexico City

The White House announced Monday a $1.4-billion military and security package to assist Mexico and several Central American countries in their fight against drug-trafficking groups threatening the region's democracies.

President Bush requested an initial $550-million appropriation from Congress, with the rest of the funds to be distributed over one or two years. The aid is to go for helicopters, police training and communications and data-processing equipment.

The package "delivers vital assistance for our partners in Mexico and Central America, who are working to break up drug cartels and fight organized crime," Bush said. "All of these are urgent priorities of the United States, and the Congress should fund them without delay."

In Mexico, Guatemala and other countries in the region, drug traffickers have infiltrated police agencies, killed scores of public officials and journalists, and gunned down or decapitated rivals. The terror they sow has silenced the media in several Mexican cities and towns along the border with the U.S.

The initial request includes $500 million for Mexico and an additional $50 million for six Central American countries. The aid would mark a tenfold increase in the annual drug assistance now provided to Mexico.

The plan came after months of negotiations between U.S. and Mexican officials. Mexican diplomats had said that Bush and Mexican President Felipe Calderon would announce the plan at a joint appearance. But in the end, Bush made the official announcement at a Washington news conference.

Mexican officials appeared caught off guard by the Washington news. Just an hour before the Bush news conference, Mexico's Foreign Ministry said it would have no announcement Monday on the proposed aid package.

"The Mexican state must confront organized crime groups that have enormous resources and highly sophisticated weapons," Foreign Minister Patricia Espinosa said at a news conference. "Given the dimensions of the problem, cooperation with the government of the United States is indispensable."

Democrats on Capitol Hill complained that the Bush administration drafted the proposal without consulting Congress.

"With 'Plan Mexico,' the devil will be in the details, and to this point, details are scarce," Sen. Robert Menendez (D-N.J.) said in a statement. "Dropping a $1.4-billion plan on our doorstep without much forewarning makes it harder to build a consensus and develop sound policy."

More than 3,000 people have been killed in Mexico's drug wars since January 2006. And drug traffickers are said to be trying to influence next month's presidential election in Guatemala: They are believed to have killed several dozen party officials and candidates in the last year.

Officials called the plan "the Merida Initiative," after the Mexican city where Bush and Calderon met in March to discuss security and other issues. But the Mexican media long ago dubbed the aid package "Plan Mexico," a reference to Plan Colombia, the 2000 initiative under which U.S. taxpayers have spent billions to assist Colombia in battling its drug cartels.

Indeed, the proposal calls for the largest aid package to Latin America since Plan Colombia. But Mexican officials stress that, unlike that plan, this one will involve no U.S. military personnel on the recipient's soil.

"This is not a Plan Colombia," Espinosa said in a recent interview with The Times. "There has been agreement with the Americans in a framework of cooperation with Mexico that does not include military troops."

Plan Colombia has strengthened that country's judicial and police institutions, but has done little to stop the flow of cocaine north. Mexico and Central America are way stations in the shipment of cocaine to the United States: U.S. officials estimate drug traffickers transfer $8 billion to $24 billion in profits from the U.S. to Mexico annually.

Bush announced the new plan as part of his supplemental funding request for military spending in Iraq and Afghanistan for the 2008 fiscal year. Details will be included in the appropriations requests likely to be submitted this week.

Administration officials said the centerpiece of the aid package would be training Mexico's police forces. Mexican diplomats said negotiations dragged on for months because representatives from a dozen police, military and drug enforcement agencies on both sides of the border were involved in drafting the details.

Jorge Chabat, a Mexico City security analyst, said the aid would mark a dramatic change in the quantity of counter- narcotics aid to Mexico.

"Obviously, it doesn't solve the drug problem, but with this help the Mexican government will probably be more effective in fighting the traffickers," he said. "But if Mexico doesn't do much more than accept the money, the help won't be effective. Basically, the big problem here is corruption."

Chabat said the U.S. had long resisted major aid to Mexico because of fears the money would be channeled to police and officials with ties to the drug trade.

"If the U.S. government is willing to give this much money, it suggests they have confidence that Calderon's government will eventually be successful in controlling corruption," he said.

Calderon has made the drug war a signature element of his presidency, sending army troops into several Mexican states and extraditing top cartel operatives to face trial in the U.S

Human rights groups expressed skepticism about the initiative's ability to address issues at the core of the drug trade: high demand for illicit drugs in the U.S., and poverty in Mexico and other countries.

"We need to be clear that while this package may have a positive short-term impact on drug trafficking and violence in Mexico, there should be no expectations that it will stem the flow of drugs into the United States," said Maureen Meyer of the Washington Office on Latin America.

hector.tobar@latimes.com

Cecilia Sanchez and Maria Antonieta Uribe of The Times' Mexico City Bureau contributed to this report.

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7. Newsday
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October 23, 2007

HEADLINE: An epidemic of Teen Drinking; What can parents do about rising alcohol use among middle- and high-school kids?

BYLINE: Contra Costa Times

Walnut Creek, Calif.

With an empty martini glass at her elbow, teenager Serena van der Woodsen, star of the CW's "Gossip Girl," leans against the tony Manhattan bar and blithely downs another vodka concoction, unscathed.

It's no surprise the frothy series about the sexy lifestyle of Upper East Side prepsters has some parents and reviewers in an uproar over its glamorized glimpse of underage drinking.

But the truth is, though American youths may not knock back limoncello and champagne as blithely as couture-clad Serena, TV shows such as "Gossip Girl" offer a fairly accurate depiction of teen partying across the country.

According to the U.S. surgeon general's office, underage consumption of beer and alcohol accounts for a quarter of alcohol sales.

Not wanting to face facts The truth is also that many parents are in denial.

Parents think, "Oh, not my wonderful children," said parenting expert Ksenija Soster Olmer. "They pretend it's not happening, that it couldn't happen to their family."

But according to the 2005 National Survey on Drug Use and Health, it is happening - to 11 million youths ages 12 to 20.

Although the overall percentage of drinkers has held fairly steady for the past five years, the most recent statistics from that survey show teens have begun drinking at younger ages, and binge drinking has surged. Nearly 7.2 million teens report that they sometimes down five or more alcoholic beverages in a single sitting.

It's the middle-school numbers that psychologist Sara Denman of Danville finds most alarming. Teen drinking is not just glamorized, she said, "it's accepted. It's expected. Now, if you're not going to [drink], you hold a beer so people think you are."

It's "an epidemic of underage drinking that germinates in elementary and middle school with 9- to 13-year-olds and erupts on college campuses, where 44 percent of students binge drink," said Columbia University's Joseph Califano Jr., who heads the National Center on Addiction and Substance Abuse.

A fifth of California's seventh-graders have drunk alcohol - not sipped or tasted, but consumed at least one alcoholic drink, according to the most recent California Healthy Kids Survey. Nine percent have imbibed until they became very drunk or threw up.

The numbers go up from there. A quarter of the state's high school freshmen and 41 percent of its juniors say they have been very drunk at least once.

But blaming "Gossip Girl" and its booze-without-consequences message misses the point, said Ellen Peterson, a member of the Alcalanes Drug and Alcohol Task Force, a group in California that fights substance abuse. The lack of televised consequences doesn't carry much impact in a culture in which unsupervised teen partying is an every-weekend occurrence.

"When teens drink, they don't think about the consequences," the Diablo Valley (Calif.) College psychology professor said. "They drink to have fun, to make talking easier, to lose inhibitions. I'm not sure if showing consequences makes much difference."

Teens focus on the here and now, Denman said, not grim prospects down the road.

Parents are a critical piece when it comes to addressing the issue.

But they're also part of the problem, Califano said. According to a 2006 study produced by Califano's department, 99 percent of parents said they would never serve alcohol to minors. But 28 percent of partygoing teens said parents had chaperoned their booze-soaked parties.

Too many parents are either naive or delusional - or they're buying the keg so they can "supervise" the drinking, said Olmer. Add in the secrecy and frequency of unsupervised parties and the time constraints of curfews, and you've got a recipe for disaster.

"Even the best kids make stupid decisions," Olmer said. "The circumstances are conducive to being drunk. It's not an excuse, but I see how it leads to their doing that. They're knocking them down to get drunk as fast as possible."

The solution has to come from not just one home, Olmer said, but all of them.

Monkey see ...

"There's a lot of drinking and partying going on in the parents' lives too, and no one's talking about that," she said. "There's media influence, but we don't have to look that far. It's in our communities. That's the reality.

" What's needed is a new approach, said Berkeley's Norman Constantin, program director of the Public Health Institute's Center for Research on Adolescent Health and Development.

"Alcohol is a reality in the lives of young Americans," Constantin said. "Our drinking age of 21 eliminates the opportunity for parents to legally teach safe drinking to their teens. This missed opportunity can lead to unsafe and immoderate drinking, especially on college campuses.

"Most teens would benefit from being taught how to not to drink, together with how to drink safely and moderately when and if they do drink," he said. "Both skills are critically important."

In the meantime, Olmer said, parents need to model appropriate behavior, set firm limits and have those difficult conversations with their teens.

DANGERS, DEADLY RESULTS

The dangers of alcohol are not limited to the threat of a hangover or puking in the lap of a boyfriend or girlfriend.

Alcohol, adolescent health experts say, has a dramatic effect on risky sexual activity, physical assault and teen drunken-driving deaths.

And recent research has tied early drinking to adult alcoholism. A teen who begins drinking before age 15 is four times more likely to develop alcohol dependency as an adult.

- Contra Costa Times

For more information on the U.S. surgeon general's call to action on underage drinking, including a pamphlet for families, visit surgeongeneral.gov /topics/underagedrinking.

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8. New York Times
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October 23, 2007

HEADLINE: Bush Asks Congress for $1.4 Billion to Fight Drugs in Mexico BYLINE: James C. McKinley Jr.

DATELINE: Mexico City, Oct. 22

President Bush asked Congress on Monday to approve a $1.4 billion aid package over the next three years to help the Mexican government fight narcotics traffickers, who have unleashed a bloody underworld war that has left more than 4,000 dead across Mexico in the last two years.

The plan calls for the United States to give Mexico $500 million over the next 12 months to provide training for the police and tools to dismantle drug cartels, including helicopters, surveillance planes, drug-sniffing dogs and software to track cases.

An additional $50 million would go to Central American countries for the same purposes.

The United States would also provide advisers to help vet police recruits, establish a witness protection program and set up citizen-complaint offices to cut down on the endemic corruption in Mexican police forces, State Department officials said.

Thomas A. Shannon Jr., the assistant secretary of state for Western Hemisphere affairs, said the initiative was intended to bolster the administration of President Felipe Calderon as it continues an unprecedented crackdown on organized crime.

Since taking office in December, Mr. Calderon has sent tens of thousands of troops into towns once controlled by drug cartels to restore order; extradited several well-known drug kingpins to the United States for prosecution; and stepped up seizures of cocaine, guns and illicit cash. The result has been a violent backlash from criminal organizations.

''We are at an important moment when organized crime presents a real threat to democratic governments in Central America and Mexico,'' Mr. Shannon said during a telephone news conference in Washington.

Later, Mr. Shannon said Mexico had changed since 1997, when the United States last provided it with a major aid package to combat drug trafficking. Under that plan, the United States provided 73 helicopters, which were later returned amid Mexican charges that they were defective and American countercharges that they were poorly maintained, and training for elite commando units, some of whom later defected and became gunmen for the Gulf Cartel.

''This government focuses on fighting crime rather than managing it,'' Mr. Shannon said. ''I think this is the kind of government we need to work with.''

Billed as a ''security cooperation initiative,'' the agreement grew out of talks Mr. Bush held with Mr. Calderon last March in Merida, Mexico. Before and after the meeting, the Mexican president said the United States did too little to reduce demand for drugs and to stop the flow of arms and cash southward into Mexico. Under the agreement, the United States has pledged to continue its efforts on both fronts.

But the bulk of the agreement is aid for Mexico, in the form of training for the police and military as well as aircraft and advanced technology at border crossings. If approved by Congress, the program will last at least two years but opens the door for a long-term, yearly transfer of money and training to Mexico to combat drug trafficking, as the United States currently does with Colombia.

Experts on the Mexican police say that money from the United States alone cannot change the underlying problems that allow the drug trade to flourish. Most Mexican police forces lack the means to investigate corrupt officers or evaluate police performance. That, coupled with low pay, has led to a system rife with officers on the payroll of criminal gangs.

''The problem will arise if these resources do not come with new controls on the police,'' said Ernesto Lopez Portillo, the executive director of the Institute for Security and Democracy. ''More resources without internal and external controls are very dangerous.''

Mexico's foreign minister, Patricia Espinosa, said none of the aid would be cash. Instead, she said, Mexico would receive resources like helicopters and training.

She and Mr. Shannon said the number of United States law enforcement officials in Mexico would not grow. American military units or commandos from American law enforcement agencies would not operate here, as they have in Colombia, Ms. Espinosa said

''We believe in free and sovereign states managing to develop a mature relationship of mutual respect, although it's hard for some people to believe,'' she said.

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9. Washington Post
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October 23, 2007

HEADLINE: Bush Seeking Aid for Mexico In Drug Fight

BYLINE: Manuel Roig-Franzia

DATELINE: Mexico City, Oct. 22

President Bush announced Monday in Washington that he will ask Congress to approve a $500 million package to help Mexico fight drug cartels, the largest international anti-drug effort by the United States in nearly a decade.

The proposal could represent a seismic shift in relations between the two countries, whose law enforcement agencies and policymakers have often bickered over the drug war, as well as other hugely contentious issues such as immigration reform and trade.

U.S. and Mexican negotiators reached the agreement in secrecy. Some in Mexico worried that an aid package would infringe upon its sovereignty, and concerns surfaced in the United States about costs and strategy in light of the oft-criticized effort to combat drugs in Colombia.

The much-anticipated Mexico aid plan, which is included in the president's $46 billion supplemental budget request for war funding, would pay for helicopters, canine units, communications gear and inspection equipment, the State Department said.

The program also would include training and technical advice on vetting new police officers, and case-management software to track investigations in a nation where drug kingpins have infiltrated many state and local governments and infighting among drug traffickers has cost more than 4,000 lives in the past 22 months.

The violence is particularly acute in northern Mexico, where gunfights frequently spill across the U.S. border, a major reason congressional delegations in Texas and other border states have pushed for the aid deal.

Mexico's drug cartels have been engaged in a fierce war for at least two years as they compete for lucrative trade routes and to try to fill power vacuums left after the extradition of several major cartel leaders to face trial in the United States.

Although the bulk of U.S. attention is focused on Mexico, Bush also announced an additional $50 million in proposed aid for Central American nations that have been beset by rampant violence and drug cartel corruption as traffickers seek new routes for the tons of cocaine and other drugs that flow into the United States every day. The aid packages are part of what the Bush administration hopes will be a multiyear, $1.4 billion initiative.

Bush barely mentioned the package in his budget remarks. But within minutes of his announcement, the White House -- cognizant of possible opposition in Congress -- launched a public relations offensive, distributing a statement about the aid plan that was followed by enthusiastic news releases from the U.S. ambassador to Mexico, Antonio O. Garza Jr., and the State Department.

"This initiative . . . represents a fundamental shift in strengthening our strategic partnership and is the single most aggressive undertaking ever to combat Mexican drug cartels," Garza said.

In a conference call with reporters, Thomas A. Shannon Jr., the State Department's top diplomat for the Western Hemisphere, hailed the president's request as "historic" and predicted it could create "a new paradigm" in U.S.-Mexico relations.

Mexico's foreign minister, Patricia Espinosa Cantellano, called the request "a program of cooperation" rather than an aid package, and said it would give Mexico "better tools to protect the population from organized crime."

The proposal could face difficulties in Congress, where some members have complained that Mexico and the Bush administration have been negotiating for months in secret.

Rep. Eliot L. Engel (D-N.Y.), chairman of the House Foreign Affairs subcommittee on the Western Hemisphere, said he plans to hold a hearing on the proposal Thursday.

"Congress was not consulted as the plan was developed. This is not a good way to kick off such an important effort to fight the increase in narco-trafficking and violence in the region," Engel said in a statement. "I hope that the administration will be more forthcoming with members of Congress now that they have announced the plan."

Few hard details are known about the Mexico aid package, which has been dubbed the Merida Initiative because Bush and Mexican President Felipe CalderÃ3n discussed it during a summit in the Yucatan city in March.

The naming of the proposal has become a nettlesome issue, illustrating the sensitivities of talks between Mexico and the United States.

In Mexico, the news media have dubbed it Plan Mexico, a moniker that infuriates top Mexican officials because of its similarity to Plan Colombia, an ongoing, multibillion-dollar program launched seven years ago that sent U.S. troops to Colombia as part of an effort to eradicate coca production and battle Marxist rebels.

The State Department released a general outline of the Mexico proposal Monday, but Shannon declined to go into detail until meeting with members of Congress on Tuesday. Shannon also said it was too early to say how many years the program would last.

Shannon said the aid package would emphasize the use of civilian authorities to combat drug cartels, but he added, "We recognize that the military of Mexico does have a role to play."

Bush administration officials have praised CalderÃ3n for deploying more than 20,000 soldiers and federal police officers to fight drug gangs, but human rights groups have complained about use of the military after a series of rapes and rights violations in which security forces were allegedly involved.

Rights groups have also expressed concerns about whether training conducted by the United States could someday help another generation of Mexican cartel assassins. U.S. military instructors are widely believed to have been involved in training some members of Los Zetas, a group of former elite Mexican troops who serve as hit men for the powerful Gulf cartel.

Shannon, who said he is aware of the history of Los Zetas, said, "We can't allow ourselves to be dominated by fear about what might happen."

Joy Olson, director of the nonprofit Washington Office on Latin America, said Monday she is concerned that the Bush administration did not say which Mexican agencies would receive aid money.

"If they are allocated to civilian control structures, the funds are more likely to have a positive effect in strengthening the rule of law and civilian institutions," Olson said. "If funds are sent directly to the receiving countries' military forces, the plan could undermine civilian control of the armed forces and weaken efforts to strengthen civilian public security institutions."

The administration released even fewer details about the Central American aid plan, which it said would help combat drugs and human trafficking. Those funds, Shannon said in the conference call, would be "shared in some fashion with all the Central American countries."

Staff writers Peter Baker and Karen DeYoung in Washington contributed to this report.

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10. USA Today
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October 23, 2007

HEADLINE: White House pledges $1.4B for Mexico drug war

BYLINE: Chris Hawley

Mexico City — The White House pledged $1.4 billion Monday to aid Mexico's crackdown on drug-related crime that has spread across the border into the USA.

The package includes a wide range of logistical assistance and equipment, including training for troops, surveillance planes, helicopters and X-ray machines.

The aid will not include U.S. troops.

The Bush administration asked Congress for the initial $500 million in a supplemental budget request, along with an additional $50 million for Central American countries.

"We are at a particular moment in which organized crime presents a very real threat to the stability and well-being of democratic states in Mexico and Central America," said Thomas Shannon, assistant U.S. secretary of State for the Western Hemisphere.

Previous Mexican governments have had little visible success in curtailing drug smuggling, but the U.S. government credits recent Mexican efforts with a decline in cocaine supply in many U.S. cities.

Days after taking office, Mexican President Felipe Calderón ordered thousands of troops into his home state of Michoacán, a center of methamphetamine production, to quell drug violence.

That was followed by deployments of troops to Nuevo Laredo, Tijuana, Acapulco and other drug hotspots.

Drug gangs have responded by assassinating several top police officials.

A recent report commissioned by the Texas Border Security Council says more than 2,100 people have been killed in drug-related violence in Mexico since Jan. 1.

The report, whose chief author was former State Department counterterrorism agent Fred Burton, also said criminal activity was spreading across the border in part because of corruption by unspecified "low- and midlevel U.S. law enforcement officials."

"The United States will do all it can to support Mexico's efforts to break the power and impunity of drug organizations and to strengthen Mexico's capabilities to deal with these common threats," White House spokeswoman Dana Perino said in a statement.

Calderón's government requested the aid package during a summit in March in Mérida, Mexico, Shannon said.

The request marked a major shift in Mexico's dealings with the United States.

Mexico has long avoided U.S. military intervention, turning down most military aid offers, refusing to participate in joint military exercises and barring U.S. troops from operating on Mexican soil. The distrust dates from the Mexican-American war in 1846-1848, in which Mexico lost half of its territory to the United States.

The increase in organized crime has made the problem more urgent to the Mexican public, overwhelming objections to U.S. involvement, said Ana Laura Magaloni, a professor of international law at the Center for Economics Research and Education, a top foreign policy school in Mexico City.

The funds for Mexico are part of a budget request that also asks for $46 billion to fund wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.

"If the U.S. Congress approves the funds, both countries will benefit in their efforts against this scourge," Mexico's Foreign Relations Secretariat said in a statement.

Shannon said the program was not similar to Plan Colombia, the U.S. program to fight drugs and insurgents in Colombia, because much of the money for Mexico seeks to improve the capability of Mexico's police to solve crimes.

According to the State Department, the funds would help establish witness protection programs, vet police officers, build computer systems to track investigations and set up citizen complaint offices.

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11. Inside Bay Area
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October 21, 2007

HEADLINE: Europe's take on its drug problem (Opinion)

Europe has a drug problem, and knows it. But the Europeans' approach to it is quite different from the American "war on drugs." I spend 120 days a year in Europe as a travel writer, so I decided to see for myself how it's working. I talked with locals, researched European drug policies and even visited a smoky marijuana "coffee shop" in Amsterdam. I got a close look at the alternative to a war on drugs.

Europeans are well aware of the U.S. track record against illegal drug use. Since President Nixon first declared the war on drugs in 1971, the United States has locked up millions of its citizens and spent hundreds of billions of dollars (many claim that if incarceration costs are figured in, a trillion dollars) waging this "war." Despite these efforts, U.S. government figures show the overall rate of illicit drug use has remained about the same.

By contrast, according to the 2007 U.N. World Drug Report, the percentage of Europeans who use illicit drugs is about half that of Americans. (Europe also has fewer than half as many deaths from overdoses.) How have they managed that -- in Europe, no less, which shocks some American sensibilities with its underage drinking, marijuana tolerance and heroin-friendly "needle parks"?

Recently, in Zurich, Switzerland, I walked into a public toilet that had only blue lights. Why? So junkies can't find their veins. A short walk away, I saw a heroin maintenance clinic that gives junkies counseling, clean needles and a safe alternative to shooting up in the streets. Need a syringe? Cigarette machines have been retooled to sell clean, government-subsidized syringes.

While each European nation has its own drug laws and policies, they seem to share a pragmatic approach. They treat drug abuse not as a crime but as an illness. And they measure the effectiveness of their drug policy not in arrests but in harm reduction.

Generally, Europeans employ a three-pronged strategy of police, educators and doctors. Police zero in on dealers -- not users -- to limit the supply of drugs. Users often get off with a warning and are directed to get treatment. Anti-drug education programs warn people (especially young people) of the dangers of drugs, but they get beyond the "zero tolerance" and "three strikes" rhetoric that may sound good to voters but rings hollow with addicts and at-risk teens. And finally, the medical community steps in to battle health problems associated with drug use (especially HIV and hepatitis C) and help addicts get back their lives.

Contrast this approach with the American war on drugs. As during Prohibition in the 1930s, the United States spends its resources on police and prisons to lock up dealers and users alike. American drug education (such as the now-discredited DARE program) seemed like propaganda, and therefore its messengers lost credibility.

Perhaps the biggest difference between European and American drug policy is how each deals with marijuana.

When I visited the Amsterdam coffee shop that openly sells pot, I sat and observed: People we're chatting; a female customer perused a fanciful array of "loaner" bongs. An older couple (who apparently didn't enjoy the edgy ambience ) parked their bikes and dropped in for a baggie to go. An underage customer was shooed away. A policeman stepped inside, but only to post a warning about the latest danger from chemical drugs on the streets. In the Netherlands, it's cheaper to get high than drunk, and drug-related crimes are rare.

After 10 years of allowed recreational marijuana use, Dutch anti-drug abuse professionals agree that there has bee