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American Morning

CASA President Discusses New Drug Abuse

Aired January 31, 2002 - 08:44   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
ANDERSON COOPER, CNN ANCHOR: The big question this hour, what are the new drugs your kids may be taking? The arrest this week of Gov. Jeb Bush's daughter highlights a new and growing danger of substance abuse among young people. Twenty-four-year-old Noelle Bush allegedly, as we told you, tried to fill a fake prescription for the anti-anxiety drug Xanax. Drug enforcement officials say the popular sedative and a new crop of so-called club drugs are a prescription for danger.

Joining us from New York, Joseph Califano, president of the National Center on Addiction and Substance Abuse at Columbia University.

Thanks very much for being with us.

JOSEPH CALIFANO, PRESIDENT, CASA: Nice to be here.

COOPER: I think a lot of parents were probably caught by surprise by this story out of Florida allegedly about Noelle Bush. What prescription drugs like Xanax and Ritalin -- we're hearing a lot more about them these days. Why are they growing in popularity among young people?

CALIFANO: I think they're easy to get your hands on. They can be in a medicine cabinet of your parents or your parents' friends, or what have you. You don't have to go through the whole dirtiness of dealing with a drug dealer the way you might have to with cocaine or heroin, or what have you. And kids don't understand how dangerous they are in part because they see so many people taking them under a prescription.

COOPER: Your parents know about cocaine and marijuana, but there are a whole new generation of drugs -- a lot of people call them club drugs -- which they probably don't know about. I want to talk about some of them with you and maybe talk about what parents should look for.

The first on is GHB -- gamma-hydroxybutyrate.

CALIFANO: GHB, ecstasy, all the methamphetamines, pills -- very small. Kids will get high, they'll get glassy eyed. These are very easy drugs to get your hands on; unfortunately, they are widely available. And parents really have to spend time with their kids, so they see their kids. The most important thing for parents to do with kids is have dinner with them. We've done survey after survey, and the more often a parent has dinner with their teens, the less likely that teen is to smoke, drink, or use drugs.

COOPER: GHB, though, in the media is often described as the date rape drug, but it's actually used recreationally by a growing number of people.

CALIFANO: You can call it recreation -- it's very dangerous recreation, that's true. It's widely used. Not as widely used as ecstasy. That's the number one drug right now.

COOPER: What's interesting is it's not as wisely used as ecstasy, but in terms of the number of overdoses and hospital room visits, GHB is responsible for a lot more of that than ecstasy.

CALIFANO: GHB is. And it's another example, Anderson, of kids not knowing how dangerous this stuff it is. When parents want to look for it in their kids, there are different markers between boys and girls: Girls tend to be very introverted, to be more depressed, really to be down on their self-esteem; boys exhibit something more like drunk driving, violence, fighting, truancy, much more outer directed terms.

COOPER: A lot of these drugs are very hard to detect. GHB is a liquid, it's odorless, it can be in water. Methamphetamine is a powder. My understanding is it's a very deceptive drug, because when people initially take it, they feel really good about their lives, yet it's an insidious drug because it's highly, highly addictive.

CALIFANO: It is highly addictive, and after the up, comes the down. Everything that goes up comes down. And the down, as they increase, the kids want to the take more and more and more to stay high.

COOPER: What should a parent look for? You talked about it a little bit. With a drug like GHB, which is odorless, which you can't necessarily...

CALIFANO: Really, dinner is very important because parents are talking to their kids. What do they look for? They want to know what their kids are doing. They want to know about the CD world; the music world is an unbelievably insidious world for many of these kids because it so glorifies drugs, and it so glorifies drugs like that and violence with respect to sex.

Secondly, I think parents have enormous power over their kids. We know from all the work we've done that the most underutilized tool in dealing with this drug issue is parents.

COOPER: Are there physical sign that a parent should look for?

CALIFANO: Sure there are physical signs. There are moodiness;, introversion, as I said, with respect to girls, more outer directed stuff, in respect to boys; dramatic changes in academic performance; kids staying in their rooms; sleeping.

COOPER: People stay up for days on crystal meth.

CALIFANO: Yes. People stay up for days and get strung out, and their kids get very high strung. But parents can prevent -- their engagement in their kids' lives is the most important way of preventing it, and talking to their kids and sending a strong message: Don't use it, that's not a standard of conduct acceptable in our family. Those things work.

Another thing that works is religion. We know that kids that say religion is an important part of their lives are much less likely to use these drugs or smoke or drink.

COOPER: The first lady of Florida is a board member of your organization. What advice would you give to her or any other parent out there if they do detect a problem in their child?

CALIFANO: I think those are two very dedicated parents, and the fact this can happen anywhere, Gov. Jeb is the number one governor in this country on this issue: He's the only governor every year before the legislature opens, he has a drug summit with all the people, to get more money for treatment, more help for that. He has something called Prevention First, in which he gathers, for a couple of days, all the high school counselors and the student leaders, and he celebrates something called Family Day, to get people more engaged with their kids. This tragedy can befall any family, because he is, really, the best governor on this subject in the country.

COOPER: Joseph Califano, thanks very much for being with us this morning.

CALIFANO: Nice to be here.

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