Anti-Drug Operations, 2000s

Other Domestic Policies

Another policy involved preventing substance use in schools, and in 2002, the U.S. Supreme Court gave schools the authority to randomly drug test students under the presumption that random testing would give young adults incentive to abstain from substance use. Federal support for random drug testing was established in 2004. Prevention programs in the workplace were encouraged by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, the U.S. Department of Labor, and the U.S. Department of Transportation. The Drug-Free Workplace Alliance signed in 2004 encouraged cooperation between labor unions and employers to improve worker safety and health through drug-free workplace programs. Finally, in the media, the National Youth Anti-Drug Media Campaign was the government's largest public health communication effort. Its objective was to educate the public about the negative consequences of drug use. This campaign reached out to youth via the radio, television, and Internet.

The second objective of President Bush's National Drug Control Strategy was to reduce the rates of drug use, abuse, and addiction by developing treatment initiatives. Improving the quality and availability of substance use treatments were the primary goals. The Substance Abuse Prevention and Treatment (SAPT) Block Grant delivered by SAMHSA provided a significant resource to states for supporting treatment programs. The Access to Recovery Act (ARA) grant, established in 2003, provided help to those in greatest need for treatment. Its goals were to increase the quantity of providers and to ensure that a wide variety of treatments were available within the community. Drug Treatment Courts were also an integral part of the strategy and provided drug offenders in the criminal justice system access to treatment. For nonviolent drug offenders, drug courts combined the power of the justice system with effective substance use treatments in addition to close supervision to break the cycle of criminal behavior. However, despite the publicity drug courts receive, they are relatively trivial in the effort to treat drug-involved offenders. Drug courts have involved approximately 70,000 participants out of the over 2 million drug-involved offenders.

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