New Teen Drug Habits

While not gang related, this story I read today needs to be seen by as many parents as possible.

Those of us who work in schools and with at-risk children know this all too well, but I believe the majority of parents are blind to these facts.  Children, especially teenagers, are masters innovation.  While we outlaw and prohibit illicit drugs and alcohol, we have products in our homes that kids use to get high, often with very harmful side effects.

Look at these energy drinks...Who do you think these things are being marketed to?  Children of all ages are drawn to the colors, names, and slogans used by the companies.  As the story states,

"Energy drinks are gateway for elementary school kids...They drink it like it's water. Nurses have kids coming in with heart palpitations."

How often do parents in the check out line at the local supermarket succumb to their child's wish to buy them a drink?  Parents will often deny their child a soda, but will not hesitate to but one of these. 

How many of us have cans of compressed air laying around the house?  Often stored near the family computer or under the kitchen sink with the rest of the poison products we teach our little ones to stay away from are these bottles.  The allure to kids is that the high associated with inhaling these products can be felt immediately and last for a few minutes.  We've all been made aware of the dangers of sniffing glue and gasoline type liquids, but these inexpensive cans can be just as dangerous. 

And probably the most dangerous of the new drug trends among teens are "pharmaceutical" or "Pharm" parties.  Kids, usually teenagers, raid their parents' medicine cabinets and take what they can.  Sometimes they empty the whole bottle, other times they take a few from each bottle there.  Once at the party, every one's pills are poured into a bowl and the kids take hand fulls.  It is a pharmaceutical chex mix and it can have lethal results.  Not to mention the side effects of combining these unknown pills, they are usually washed down with alcohol.  And what happens when a kid passes out as a result of taking the wrong mix?  Many times, they are laughed at for "falling asleep" or, as has been reported in several news stories in the past few years, left for dead out of fear of punishment.  If you are a parent and have prescriptions at home, child-proof tops only keep out the small kids.  Many of us lock up our guns, jewelry, and emergency cash, but we leave these pills in a readily accessible location. Often right next to our kids' chewable vitamins.  Parents need to safely store and count the number of pills they have.  It could be a life saving difference.