Article Alert

Abstracts of a few recent articles on drug addiction.

Bower, Bruce.
ALCOHOLICS SYNONYMOUS
(Science News, vol. 151, no. 4, January 25, 1997, p. 62)

Project Match announced in December 1996 the findings of its eight-year, federally funded, $27 million investigation into how certain types of alcoholics respond to specific forms of treatment. The study concluded that alcoholics reduce their drinking sharply, and to the same degree, after completing any one of three randomly assigned treatments.

Glass, Stephen.
DON'T YOU D.A.R.E.
(The New Republic, vol. 216, no. 9, March 3, 1997, pp. 18-28)

The anti-drug and anti-alcohol program called D.A.R.E. consists of 17 weekly lessons taught in the fifth or sixth grade. The teachers in the popular and well-financed program are all uniformed policemen trained by D.A.R.E. The author points out that in the last five years studies have appeared criticizing D.A.R.E. and questioning its effectiveness. He discusses the results of the various studies and the reasons why the public may be unaware of them.

Landry, Donald W.
IMMUNOTHERAPY FOR COCAINE ADDICTION
(Scientific American, vol. 276, no. 2, February 1997, pp. 42-45)

Landry describes a new approach for combating cocaine addiction by destroying the drug soon after it enters the bloodstream. This strategy, now being studied at Columbia University, would deliver antibodies (molecules of the immune system designed by nature to bind to a variety of target molecules) to the bloodstream where they would trap and break the drug apart before it could reach the brain.

Lee, Rensselaer W., III.
CUBA'S DRUG TRANSIT TRAFFIC
(Society, vol. 34, no. 3, March/April 1997, pp. 49-55)

Cuba's tightly controlled political system probably has acted as a deterrent to drug smugglers (though Cuban officials have proven themselves corruptible on occasion), yet traffickers' use of Cuban territorial waters and airspace to smuggle drug cargoes northward to the Florida coast is well documented.

Nadelmann, Ethan A.
REEFER MADNESS 1997: THE NEW BAG OF SCARE TACTICS
(Rolling Stone, no. 754, February 20, 1997, pp. 51-53, 77)

Nadelmann, director of the Lindesmith Center, a drug-policy research institute, discusses various current claims about marijuana. He acknowledges that there are reasons to be concerned about marijuana which he calls a powerful psychoactive drug. However, he questions some assertions as to its harmful effects. For example, Nadelmann challenges the claims that marijuana is more potent now and that its use leads to the use of more dangerous drugs.

A more comprehensive Article Alert is offered on the International Home Page of the U. S. Information Agency: http://www.usia.gov/admin/001/wwwhapub.html

Global Issues
USIA Electronic Journal, Vol. 2, No. 3, June 1997