RX drugs in Treasure Valley schools

 

BOISE -- Teenage prescription drug use is on the rise. In fact, it's estimated that 2,700 teens across America abused a prescription drug for the first time today!

"No one knew in my family and no one knew until I was about 17, I kept it hush hush," said Adam Garcia who was addicted to prescription drugs in for six years.

Statistics show more than one in ten teens have abused prescription drugs in his or her lifetime, and while teens have cut back on the use of tobacco, alcohol and illicit drugs these past six years, they've found an alternative in prescription drugs.

One reason teens are turning to the home medicine cabinet rather than the streets is because it's available. One school resource officer says a lot of homes now days are mini-pharmacies.

"I don't think for the most part that they lock it in to the same category as cocaine or meth or something like that," said Sgt. Milt Greenwood with the Nampa Police Department.

Sergeant Milt Greenwood has spent a lot of time in Nampa schools as a School Resource Officer. He and other SRO's have dealt with several teens abusing prescription drugs.

"I think for the most part they think that because they're a prescribed drug and they're not made in some back basement, they don't realize the danger of what they're dealing with," said Greenwood.

Adam Garcia knows first hand the dangers. At 12-years-old, following a surgery, he got hooked.

"When I popped the pills and get this high and I liked it, I honestly did, I like it," said Garcia.

He, like many other teens, gets the pills from their parents without them knowing.

"My parents didn't take them, so it was rare that they checked them," said Garcia.

He popped pills so much that he says he was high all the way through junior high and high school. He can't remember any of it.

"I don't think they understand the consequences. I don't think that they understand that it's extremely harmful to their health," said Ericca Goff a School Resource Officer in Caldwell.

One way students are getting pills are at, what's called Pharming parties. That's pharming with a P-H.

"Bring what you have and they'll dump it in. A lot of kids don't even know what they're dumping in. They could be dumping in antibiotics or whatever, they just grab something out of the medicine cabinet and brought it," said Greenwood.

The danger comes from mixing drugs that have no business being mixed.

"Nobody there at those parties is a pharmacist.  Nobody knows what they're taking.  They don't know what it's for, what the causes are," said Goff.

All of that is now in Garcia's past. He's been clean for four years.

"I am doing good, really good, I am really proud of my self, I really am, it wasn't easy, I will tell you that, it wasn’t easy," said Garcia.

One in three teens across the country believe there is nothing wrong with using prescriptions drugs every once and a while.  Also, one in three teens reports knowing someone who abuses prescription drugs.

Sgt. Greenwood says the way they usually catch people at school is with the help of students who witness these drugs exchanging hands.

People in Canyon County have a convenient way to drop off their un-used prescription drugs.  It's part of the first ever Merc and Meds Community Drop-off Day.

Organizers will be on hand this Saturday from 10:00 a.m. to 4:00 p.m. taking un-wanted mercury, pills and other prescription drugs from you.  That's at the O'Connor Field house in Caldwell.