Media Coverage

Daily Record
By Michael Daigle
May 7, 2007

Teens seen turning to legal drugs for a 'high'

Easy access to medications spurs rise in abuse, Morris officials warn

The latest drug danger for teenagers and young adults is not new; it's legally purchased prescription drugs.

While teen use of cocaine, heroin, Ecstacy, methamphetamines and other hard drugs is declining, Morris County Prosecutor Michael Rubbinaccio said, illicit use of prescription and over-the-counter drugs by teens is on the rise.

Sandy Hornack, the nurse manager of the chemical dependency unit at St. Clare's Health Service's behavioral health unit, said that it is possible that all the efforts to turn children away from hard drugs have ironically helped boost the use of prescription drugs.

"Marijuana use is down," she said, "but teens will experiment for the high." They are experimenting with prescription and over-the-counter drugs, she said.

Their relative availability is the one reason the drug problem looms larger than most.

The drugs that teens are abusing, said Beth Jacobson, Morris County Municipal Alliance coordinator, are generally found in every home stored neatly and conveniently in a medicine cabinet.

Mother's little helper of the 1960s, has become junior's magic carpet ride.

Joanne Goer, director of clinical and addictive service at NewBridge Services Inc. of Pequannock, said teens are using the medicine cabinet to "shop" for drugs.

"There is no monitoring when drugs are missing," she said. "There is a ready supply of drugs for the taking and the teens feel there are no consequences."

"Today's teens are more likely to abuse prescription and over-the-counter medications than many illegal drugs. Teens think that abusing medications to get high is 'safer' than using illegal drugs. If we don't provide education to our youth concerning the true addictive qualities and long term physical effects of these drugs, I fear we may be calling this generation of children 'Generation RX,'" Rubbinaccio said.

'Clean Up day'

To raise public awareness of this issue and to provide information on the proper disposal of expired or unneeded prescription drugs, the county freeholders, Rubbinaccio and the Morris County Partners in Substance Abuse will host a "clean-up" day Wednesday at the Morris County Courthouse.

The event is scheduled for 12:30 p.m. and residents are urged to bring expired or unneeded prescription drugs for disposal.

Rubbinaccio said the main goal of Wednesday's event is to promote abuse prevention.

"We hope to encourage community members to examine the contents of their own medicine cabinets and properly discard items that are expired or no longer necessary and help reduce the availability of such drugs for teens," he said.

Jacobson said the event is also the start of a campaign to encourage the creation of prescription drug disposal sites at local police station or similar locations across the county.

Teen drug attitudes

"In 2004, 6 million Americans used one or more prescription drugs for nonmedical purposes, with 4.4 million using narcotic pain relievers," Rubbinaccio said. "A 2005 Partnership Attitude and Tracking Study revealed that an alarming number of teens have a false sense of security about the safety of abusing prescription medications."

Rubbinaccio said the survey showed that:

• 40 percent of teens believe that prescription medications are "much safer" to use than illegal drugs.
• 31 percent believe there's nothing wrong" with using prescription medicines without a prescription "once in a while."
• 29 percent believe prescription pain relievers are not addictive.

'Pharming' parties

An extreme form of this prescription drug abuse, Rubbinacchio said, is a so-called "pharming party," a get-together where prescription drugs are exchanged and consumed in order to become intoxicated/high," he said.

A group of teen "pharmers" will each try to come up with his or her contribution to the "grab bag." The donations get tossed into a pillow case, bag or bowl which then gets passed around, with each teen choosing one or a handful of drugs at a time until the supply is exhausted, he said.

Goer said teens will try even innocuous over-the-counter medication for experimentation, including cough medicines.

"The teens drink them," she said. "I once got a call about a young client who tried to get high on Listerine. They become disoriented and delusional. Anything for a high."

Rubbinaccio said the chemical of interest in cough medicines is DXM: Dextromethorphan, a synthetic drug that is chemically similar to morphine. There are 120 over-the-counter medications that include dextromethorphan, he said.

Power of advertising

Officials said parental attitudes and societal changes play a large part in the rise in teen prescription drug abuse.

One factor is the large amount of drug advertising teens see, Jacobson said. The ads have a certain "seductive" quality that makes using the drug appear legitimate, she said.

Goer said the advertising is a reflection of our way of life in an affluent society.

"It has a lot has to do with access. The pain medications are in the drawer. It is easy to grab them. We seem today to be able to get a drug for nearly every ailment," she said. "Look at our way of living. We pop a pill at the first sign of pain, take a drink after a rough day."

For many of the parents with teenagers -- the Baby Boomers -- drug use was a part of their youth, or they were aware of it.

Goer said, "it is not so different now, a permutation of the same pattern. Instead of making a drug deal they reach for the medicine chest where the painkillers are. We leave the keys in the car."

Education as antidote

The way out of the situation, the officials said, is education.

"We need to work harder to change parents' attitude toward the use of prescription drugs by teens," Rubbinaccio said. "We need parents to understand that this is a real problem right here in Morris County. Many of the drugs that are being abused by our teens are being taken directly from the 'pharmacy' located right in their own medicine cabinet."

Goer said teens are under more pressure than ever: More homework, higher expectations, more activities.

While it has always been the case that expectations for Americans teenagers are high, today it is a different scene because in many cases both parents work, there is less supervision, less community involvement.

"It is easy to blame the parents, but it is not all their fault," she said. They are often too busy and don't see what it happening.

"Parents need to be role models. They need to teach family and community values," Goer said. "No one thing works, but a little bit of everything helps."