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Health & Fitness

Teen Prescription Abuse and Drug Take Back Day

Q:  Are prescription drugs a problem for teens?

A:  One in five 11th graders from Novato admitted to abusing prescription drugs in the 2011 California Healthy Kids Survey. These types of drugs are often easily obtained and can be life threatening.

If there is a young person in your life, you may have heard that it is Red Ribbon Week: students throughout the Novato Unified School District are working to involve their peers in being committed to staying drug free.

October is packed full of “awareness issues”, and among them is National Substance Abuse Prevention Month. The Novato Blue Ribbon Coalition for Youth emphasizes preventing drug use by young people to avoid tragic losses, addiction, and other associated problems that can happen as a result of even one-time experimentation.

Prescription drugs are more frequently being seen as a “gateway drug” to addiction, since young people have easy access to medicine cabinets at home, or at a relative or friend’s house. Parents often have a hard time detecting this type of drug abuse, and don’t realize it is a problem until their child is in serious trouble.

Prescription and over-the-counter drugs (OTC) are especially dangerous when taken with alcohol or mixed with other drugs. Mixing certain drugs with alcohol, for example, can cause a person’s heart and breathing to slow down or even stop. Make sure to include these types of substances in drug awareness education for young people.

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You can also safeguard your home by disposing of unused prescription drugs and OTC medicines safely. Marin County has designated October 26th as Drug Take Back Day, and you can find a list of official disposal sites here: http://www.savesfbay.org/pharmaceutical-disposal-sites. The Novato Police Department also has a container to collect unused medicines in their lobby year-round.

On November 20th, a public screening of the movie "Behind the Orange Curtain" will be held at San Marin High School. This documentary explores the prescription drug use epidemic that is touching increasingly more families.  To find out more about this event--or how to become active with the Novato Blue Ribbon Coalition for Youth's work with youth alcohol and drug prevention--visit the Coalition website, www.novatoblueribbon.org.

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