You will not be surprised to learn that we are continuing to organize opposition to the Drug Czar's efforts to promote random student drug testing in Jacksonville, FL today. We also have supporters in Oklahoma City, OK to meet the Drug Czar's office later this week. However, you may be surprised to learn that we also had supporters in Budapest, Hungary to monitor the Drug Czar's efforts to spread student drug testing worldwide.

Check out Peter Sarosi's reflections on the blog of the Hungarian Civil Liberties Union.

I paste two highlights below, but I recommend reading his whole report:

"The Office of Narcotic Drug Control Policy (ONDCP) - an executive office of the White House - and the U.S. Department of State organized a 'demand reduction conference' on the same dates as the Beyond 2008 regional consultation meeting (read our article), from 23 January to 24 January in Budapest. This created some suspicions among European NGOs that the U.S. government wants to interfere with the UNGASS assessment process. When I asked the organizers to clarify their position, they denied that they had any intention to do so. However, it is clear that this 'demand reduction conference' aimed to promote the U.S. approach in drug policy for Central-Eastern European decision makers."


"Christina Steffner, the principal of the Hunterdon Central Regional High School, New Jersey, who presented random school drug testing at the conference did not even mentioned this research. When she was asked about the negative consequences of school drug testing, she said there are only positive impacts. She refered to the SATURN (Student-Athlete Testing Using Random Notification) study – while the lead author of this study, Linn Goldberg, MD quoted in the New York Times, 'The big thing that people say is you got to give kids a reason not to use drugs, and drug testing is a reason. That is not what we found...we didn't find any evidence that testing is a deterrent'. When participants raised concerns if it is an effective way to prevent drug abuse among students if we exlude the most vulnerable young people from extracurricular activites - she answered that actually student drug testing increased the participation in these activities among her high school students. However, the Hunterdon study was conducted by the same people who implemented student drug testing in the same school, it was not published in a peer-revied journal and it provides little information on methodology. What real scientific evidence shows is that extracurricular activities can protect youngsters from the harmful consequences of drug abuse. No surprise that many professional American organizations, like the American Association of Pedeatrics is against student drug testing. Most of the presentations of the conference can be criticized with solely using American research evidence - an astonishing proof that the official drug policy of the U.S. government secluded itself from reality. Even the drug court system - the criminal justice referal of drug offenders to treatment services - seems only a vague attempt to reduce the harms created by the war on drugs approach (the massive incarceration of drug users)."