A major drug awareness campaign targeting primary schools across the State has been launched, just one day after the publication of an international report showing Irish teenagers are the biggest binge drinkers in the EU.
The Minister for Education, Ms Hanafin, this afternoon published a new resource booklet for teachers to help them inform pupils of the risks of drug use/abuse and assist their handling of suspected or actual substance abuse cases in their schools.
The booklet Understanding Substances and Substance use - a handbook for Teacherscontains information on drugs and drug abuse including symptoms and stages of drug use, risk and protective factors. It also outlines schools substance use policy and best practice in drug education.
It will be distributed shortly to all primary schools in the State and to all post-primary schools in the South Western Area Health Board which extends from Dublin's inner city south of the Liffey to South County Dublin, Kildare and west Wicklow.
Ms Hanafin said the information campaign was important. "Intervention means that every child should have the necessary knowledge and life-skills to resist drugs or make informed choices about their health, personal lives and social development."
The launch of the booklet comes just one day after a damning international report showing that Irish teenagers are the biggest binge drinkers in the EU, with girls outstripping boys.
A European School Survey Project on Alcohol and other Drugs (ESPAD )survey reported that Irish students also had a higher-than-average prevalence of lifetime use of illicit drugs, ranking second in the table of 35 ESPAD. Irish students (39 per cent) were almost twice as likely to have used cannabis drug than the ESPAD average (21 per cent).
It also found that 32 per cent of all Irish teenagers admitted binge drinking in 2003. 'Binge' drinking was defined as having more than five alcoholic drinks in one night at least three times in the last 30 days.
The substance use booklet for primary and post primary teachers is part of the Social and Political Health Education curriculum.