How to unleash the power of prevention

Essential reading for people interested in preventing mental health problems, youth substance use, risky driving behaviors, aggressive and delinquent behaviors, adolescent violence, and self-inflicted injury:

Unleashing the Power of Prevention and A Challenge to Unleash the Power of Prevention, both released last month by the Institute of Medicine. 

The first article starts with: Every day across America, behavioral health problems in childhood and adolescence, from anxiety to violence, take a heavy toll on millions of lives. For decades the approach to these problems has been to treat them only after they’ve been identified—at a high and ongoing cost to young people, families, entire communities, and our nation. Now we have a 30-year body of research and more than 50 programs showing that behavioral health problems can be prevented. This critical mass of prevention science is converging with growing interest in prevention across health care, education, child psychiatry, child welfare, and juvenile justice. Together, we stand at the threshold of a new age of prevention. The challenge now is to mobilize across disciplines and communities to unleash the power of prevention on a nationwide scale.

What current research says about teen marijuana use

The August 2015 Journal of Adolescent Health includes four articles about teen marijuana use.

Predicting Young Adult Degree Attainment by Late Adolescent Marijuana Use

Conclusion: Results support a growing body of work suggesting that frequent marijuana use (six or more times in the past 30 days) predicts a lower likelihood of post secondary educational attainment, and this difference may originate during secondary school.

Adolescents’ Perceptions of Risks and Benefits of Conventional Cigarettes, E-cigarettes, and Marijuana: A Qualitative Analysis

Conclusion: Adolescents have learned from multiple sources about risks of using cigarettes, but they receive much less and often incorrect information regarding marijuana and e-cigarettes, likely resulting in their positive and often ambivalent perceptions of marijuana and e-cigarettes.

Trends Among U.S. High School Seniors in Recent Marijuana Use and Associations With Other Substances: 1976-2013

Conclusion: Substance use recently declined among high school seniors, except for marijuana use, particularly among black youth. The increasing association between marijuana and other substances among black adolescents suggests further amplification in critical health disparities.

Adolescents’ Use of Medical Marijuana: A Secondary Analysis of Monitoring the Future Data

Conclusion: This study is the first to provide nationally representative data on three groups of adolescent marijuana users. Although most adolescents (who use marijuana) use illicit sources, more adolescents (who use marijuana) appear to be using diverted medical marijuana, than using medical marijuana legally.

New WA marijuana legislation & its impact on local youth

During this year's state legislative session, two bills were adopted that make changes to the marijuana systems in Washington. Below is a summary as they relate to youth in NE Seattle.

Cannabis Patient Protection Act (5052)

• Eliminates medical marijuana businesses.
• Requires the newly re-named Liquor & Cannabis Board (LCB) to increase the number of marijuana retail licenses they issue.
• Creates a voluntary medical marijuana registry. Those who register as medical marijuana users are exempt from the marijuana excise tax. With a medical marijuana authorization card, people can possess more marijuana than they can without one.

Comprehensive Marijuana Market Reforms (2136)

• Permits local jurisdictions to reduce the buffer between marijuana businesses and community centers, transit centers, libraries, arcades, and child care centers from 1,000 feet to 100 feet. The 1,000 foot buffer between schools and marijuana businesses remains.
• Allows retailers to have an additional sign identifying their business and trade name.
• Prohibits consumption in a "public place" instead of "in view of the public".
• Eliminates the 25% excise taxes on marijuana producers (growers) and processors and increases the excise tax on retail marijuana sales to 37%.
• Provides some marijuana tax revenue to local jurisdictions based on retail sales and population.

Local Impact

• More businesses: LCB likely will increase the number of marijuana business licenses for Seattle.
• Smaller buffer zones: The City Council likely will reduce the 1,000 foot buffer between marijuana businesses and places where children frequently congregate.
• Business clusters: Since most of Seattle is zoned as single family residential, which is off-limits for any marijuana business, marijuana businesses likely will continue to be clustered along large arterials and in only certain areas of the city.
• Businesses in a few neighborhoods: In NE Seattle, areas that could see more marijuana businesses include the University District, Lake City, Northgate, and Jackson Park.
• Continued public use: Since most tickets for using marijuana in public are given to people in the greater Downtown area, the public use definition change likely will have little impact on NE Seattle. It is unclear if the public place definition will change enforcement of the law during festivals like Hempfest.

What Prevention Science Tells Us

• Research has repeatedly shown that the more places that sell alcohol, tobacco, and fast food in a community the more likely teenagers are to consume those products.
• Research has repeatedly shown that taxes on cigarettes and alcohol decrease youth use of those products.
• Substance use prevention coalitions are proven to reduce population-level adolescent drug use rates. This is especially true when schools that are part of coalitions implement evidence-based curricula, such as Life Skills Training and Project Alert.
• Most teenagers who use alcohol and marijuana report getting the drugs socially, mostly from friends. 

Encouraging parents to talk to their kids about marijuana

The Washington Poison Center continues to report increased "exposures" to marijuana among teenagers. In other words, kids continue to gain access to marijuana and report adverse health effects.

That's why it is particularly important for parents to talk to their children about not using marijuana. To help parents, Prevention WINS and other coalitions in the Seattle area have been conducting an awareness campaign with billboards and transit ads featuring doctors from Seattle Children's Hospital.

This one, featuring Dr. Glen Tamura, appears at the corner of Lake City Way and NE 95th Street.

The billboards direct parents to visit www.StartTalkingNow.org. Parenting guides are also available through the ADAI Clearinghouse.

Learn about impact of alcohol retail outlets on teen health

Learn more about community strategies for preventing youth drug use through a free webinar:

Restricting Alcohol Outlet Density: From Theory to Practice

July 23, 2015

11:00 a.m. to 12:15 p.m.

Learn from policy experts about the impact of high concentrations of alcohol retail establishments on community health, evidence-based practices to control the density of these establishments, and measures that communities can take to reduce negative impacts of existing outlets. Hear about grassroots community work in establishing and enforcing restrictions. 

Register here. 

Hosted by the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration.

WA Attorney General asks Liquor Control Board to ban flavored marijuana products

Last December, the Prevention WINS coalition sent a letter to the WA Liquor Control Board (WSLCB) reiterating our advice included in a June 2013 letter to ban marijuana products that are fruit and candy flavored. Our December 2014 letter said:


To treat marijuana as a public health issue, not a criminal justice issue, public health research on other products that are harmful to minors should be heeded.  Public health experts have found that fruit-flavored alcohol and tobacco products are popular among underage users.  

• Fruit-flavored alcohol products are marketed to and popular among youth. 

• Fruit and candy flavored cigarettes are banned by the 2009 Family Smoking Prevention Tobacco Control Act.

• Public health officials recently recommended that the Food and Drug Administration prohibit flavors in all tobacco products, not just cigarettes.   They cite “scientific evidence on flavored tobacco and its relationship with initiation and maintenance of tobacco use among youth and young adults.”  

To avoid similar public health problems associated with sweet-flavored marijuana products, Washington has the unique opportunity to protect child and adolescent health by strictly regulating marijuana before the industry is fully formed.  It will be much more difficult to do so in the future, as is evident by current public health efforts to more tightly regulate tobacco and alcohol products that have been legal for a long time.  

On May 6, the WA Attorney General's Office sent a letter to the WSLCB reiterating their similar comments. They referred to comments they, too, made in December that included:

Congress banned most flavored cigarettes -- an obviously non-edible product -- precisely because research showed that these products were especially appealing to children. The issue paper also refers to emerging research regarding youth-appealing flavored electronic cigarettes -- another non-edible category of product. 

As we understand it, WAC 314-55-077 empowers the WSLCB to prohibit only marijuana-infused products that are especially appealing to children. Because flavored usable marijuana and flavored marijuana concentrates are potentially especially appealing to children, these categories of products likewise should be subject to the WSLCB's authority under WAC 314-55-077. 

New campaign urges parents to talk to kids about marijuana

Recently, University of Washington researchers found that only 57 percent of Washington parents in a survey knew the legal age for recreational pot use.  

A new campaign to educate parents about the law and the importance of talking to children about marijuana recently was launched by Prevention WINS, the PEACE Coalition, and other stakeholders in Seattle. Three physicians from Seattle Children’s Hospital are featured in the campaign. With an increase in the number of Poison Center calls for teenagers who have consumed too much marijuana, physicians are particularly concerned.  

Parents are the number one influence on children, even in their teen years, so it’s important to know the law when talking to children about it. Research also shows that it is important for adults to help children develop the social and emotional skills needed to avoid drug use. For more than 20 years prevention programs have rejected scare tactics and have been providing parents with advice about promoting healthy decision-making among teenagers. With mixed messages children are receiving about risks associated with teenagers using marijuana, these parenting skills are more important than ever.  

For the record, it is legal only for people 21 years old and above to use marijuana in Washington.  
What else do parents and teenagers need to know about the law?

• Legal products include foods and beverages with marijuana in them.Some of these products may be attractive to youth and mistaken for common food and beverages. Examples include candy, soft drinks, and baked-goods.

• It is illegal for people under 21 to drive under the influence of any amount of marijuana.  

• The new law allows marijuana advertising. Be aware of marijuana advertising that your child is exposed to online, in magazines and newspapers, and in the community. Talk about the ads and the messages they send, especially if ads use images of young adults. Use these talks to stress your family rules about not using drugs, including marijuana.

• It is illegal for adults to provide marijuana to people under the age of 21, including parents giving their own children marijuana (unless they have a medical marijuana authorization.)  

• It is illegal to grow marijuana at home unless a medical marijuana authorization is obtained.  

• It is illegal to consume (smoke, eat, drink) marijuana products in public.

Black market marijuana continues to be avaiable to teenagers

Black market marijuana costs one-third as much as marijuana sold in legal (I-502) stores, according to an article appearing in today's Seattle Times.  "State Liquor Control Board (LCB) Director Rick Garza acknowledged a black market for marijuana likely will remain even after a system overhaul.  Garza assumes about 25 percent of the state's current black market is considered to be people under 21 who aren't allowed to buy recreational marijuana legally."

Black market marijuana is largely shared or sold to high school students by their friends.  Results from the 2012 Seattle Public School Youth Risk Behavior Survey show that almost 70% of high school students who use marijuana get it from friends.  

Black market marijuana in Washington is largely grown in Washington. So much is grown locally, Washington weed is sold throughout the United States. 

To eliminate the black market, Washington and local jurisdictions can invest in substance use prevention to reduce demand and enforce laws to reduce supply.  Changing the medical marijuana system will help reduce a significant portion of the supply to underage users, but not as much as investing in methods for preventing youth marijuana access and use for which coalitions like Prevention WINS have been advocating for long before state voters approved I-502.

Seattle Schools: Most drug disciplinary actions involve marijuana

Last night, KOMO broadcast a story about marijuana-related disciplinary incidents among Seattle students so far this school year.



While school administrators mostly confiscate smoked marijuana from students, they are increasingly confiscating marijuana-infused foods and beverages as they learn to differentiate them from regular foods.

NE Seattle adults encouraged to Mind Your Meds

The Prevention WINS coalition is launching a Mind Your Meds campaign with NE Seattle middle and high schools sending fact sheets home with report cards.  The campaign encourages adults to lock up medications as a way to prevent prescription drug abuse among teenagers. 

While less than 10% of NE Seattle middle and high school students report abusing prescription drugs, the rates of abuse steadily increased among 8^th and 10^th graders since 2008. The Prevention WINS coalition is particularly concerned about this trend considering potential health consequences related with prescription drug abuse. 

Percent of students reporting abusing prescription drugs, Washington State Healthy Youth Survey

Learn more about the Mind Your Meds campaign and what you can do to prevent teen medicine abuse! View and share short clips on the Prevention WINS YouTube page about what NE Seattle parents can do.