Parents, talk to your kids about experimenting with drugs – Brunswick News

Parents, talk to your children. Aunts, uncles and close family friends, help parents impress upon youth the dangers of experimenting with drugs not prescribed to them by a physician for a medical purpose.

In a war it is good to have allies. That is no less true in todays war on drugs.

Too many people, especially young people, are dying from overdosing. Too many human vultures are profiting from the drug-induced misery and breakdown of individuals, both young and not-so-young.

The dangers of drugs can be ingrained in children at an early age. Former First Lady Nancy Reagan suggested reminding children early and often to just say no to drugs. Critics pooh-poohed her recommendation for lack of sophistication, but when dealing with impressionable minds, simplicity cannot be overstated.

But no strategy works better than a face-to-face conversation between a loving, caring parent and child. It is quite powerful. Many find it to be an effective weapon against negative peer pressure.

This urgent advice comes in the wake of a recent report by the Georgia Department of Public Health Drug Surveillance Unit. It warns that reports of overdoses over the past month have been on the rise in Georgia.

That is particularly true with overdoses where fentanyl was mixed in with other drugs. It is no surprise that the misuse of fentanyl can lead to overdose and death. This synthetic opioid is said to be as much as 100 times stronger than heroin.

Odds are better than even that it is in the drugs being hawked on the streets to older preteens, teens and adults who are gullible or foolish enough to buy and use them.

According to the drug surveillance unit, health officials reported at least 66 visits to emergency rooms between early February and mid-March by patients who had taken drugs that were laced with fentanyl. The drugs spiked with fentanyl included cocaine, crack, heroin, methamphetamine, pain killers and cannabis products.

Overdose deaths related to the ingestion of fentanyl have shot up substantially across the state since the early days of the COVID-19 pandemic, state officials report. By how much? The answer: 106% over the 12 months following May 1, 2020.

Parents, talk to your children.

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Parents, talk to your kids about experimenting with drugs - Brunswick News