Just say... what exactly? | Vapor State

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Just say... what exactly?

More than two decades of anti-drugs campaigns have been largely fruitless in preventing drug use among young people, says a report. With teenage rebellion as it is, are such campaigns doomed to fail?

First it was Zammo, now it's Frank.

Twenty years after the Grange Hill pupil told its young BBC audience to "Just Say No" to drugs, young people are being told to "Talk to Frank", a figurative friend who offers advice and information.

A report to the UK Drugs Policy Commission, which was launched on Wednesday, says there is little evidence such campaigns reduce rates of drug use.

Getting a moral message across to young people is notoriously difficult. George Bush's US administration has spent more than $1bn promoting sexual abstinence, but research this week suggested it had had no effect.

On the other hand, the famous gravestone Aids adverts were credited with reducing HIV infections in the UK 20 years ago.

So after two decades of trying almost everything, how can any anti-drugs campaigns succeed?

With difficulty, says Neil Hunt, director of KCA - a drug and alcohol service provider. He thinks money is better spent on so-called secondary prevention, targeting vulnerable groups like young offenders and children in care.

"However much societies would like to have them, campaigns and programmes of this sort, which hope to prevent drug use in the first place, are surrounded by unrealistic expectations and will not deliver this to any significant extent.

"Patterns of drug consumption are too embedded and youth culture and peer influences have a far greater effect that is just not amenable to central initiatives like these."

The medium can be as important as the content, says Dan Clays, managing director at digital media specialist BLM Quantum.

"Distribution on social networking sites and consumer-generated content would have more impact because youth media consumption is so fragmented and traditional channels are dwarfed by digital media.

'Alarmist'
"Today's youth are more enfranchised and have more control than ever over the media and advertising they receive, so where the message is placed must reflect this to have any recognition."

The message itself has changed since the first campaign in 1985, a year before Zammo's habit made national headlines.

The slogan of the series of short films was Heroin Screws You Up, although evidence suggested it led to some glamorisation of addiction and the "heroin chic" fashion style.

A similar tone was used throughout the 80s and 90s, which was a time of rocketing drug use among young people.

Ecstasy was linked to the death in 1995 of Leah Betts, who collapsed at her 18th birthday party and the image of her on a life-support machine was used in a subsequent poster campaign entitled Sorted.

But the Talk to Frank campaigns launched in 2003 marked a significant change in emphasis. A narrator, speaking in a conversational way, directs viewers to a website and telephone line - an information and advice service called Frank.

Moving story
While the potential risks of drugs like crystal meth and cannabis are spelled out, there is acknowledgement that some drugs can have a benign effect, like ecstasy making people hug each other. Appearing on television, online and even in a Hollyoaks storyline, the cost so far is £24m.

Explaining the shift in strategy, a Home Office spokesman says: "We moved on from 'Just Say No' to empowering people with information - for example, if you take crystal meth, this is what happens to your teeth - so they can make informed and educated choices.

"The good news is that drug use has fallen by a fifth among 16 to 24-year-olds over the last 10 years.

"There are also record numbers of people undergoing treatment so it's not as if we're spending all this money on glitzy adverts and nothing else. We've spent £7.5bn on drugs policy since 1998."

It's difficult to judge the impact of Frank, says Martin Barnes, chief executive of DrugScope, but he thinks giving people credible information was a welcome change in direction.

'Anguish'
"Teenage drug use increased so much in the 90s and 80s that alarmist campaigns like Just Say No lost credibility because young people knew drug users who were not coming to harm. So rather than look at the risks, they thought 'what I'm being told is nonsense because one smoke of cannabis doesn't kill you.'"

Success should not be judged solely on rates of use - which have fallen - but on making people aware of the risks and reducing harm, he says. And the distinction between casual drug users and problematic ones needs to be made.

Mr Barnes believes the Leah Betts campaign backfired because young people who experimented with ecstasy knew a tablet was very unlikely to kill them.

But the parents of another teenager believe sharing their tragic story has made a difference.

A video showing the transformation of Rachel Whitear from a bright teenager to a 21-year-old slumped in a rented room in Exmouth was circulated to schools three years after her death from a heroin overdose. It is still watched by Year 7 pupils today.

Her parents, Mick and Pauline Holcroft, featured in the 22-minute video and accompanied viewings of it.

Mrs Holcroft says although it's impossible to quantify the impact, the young audiences she saw watching it were moved.

"Several of them came to us and said 'I'm never going to do that.' That made all the effort and pain and anguish worthwhile."