Government aims to reduce illegal drug use by 25 percent
By Ken Guggenheim
Associated Press

WASHINGTON — President Bush on Tuesday set a goal of reducing illegal drug use by 25 percent over the next five years by improving law enforcement and treating more addicts.

His administration’s anti-drug strategy seeks a 10 percent reduction in drug use within two years.

“We’re putting the fight against drugs in the center of our national agenda,” Bush said in an East Room ceremony attended by lawmakers, ambassadors and anti-drug officials.

“We’ve got a problem in this country: Too many people use drugs,” he said. “This is an individual tragedy and as a result it is a social crisis.”

The subject had to be an especially personal one for the president. His niece, Noelle Bush, has been admitted to a drug treatment program, her lawyer said, after having been accused of prescription drug fraud.

Bush called on families, religious organizations and community groups to join the fight against drugs.

He told parents they should remind their children every day that they love them, adding: “If you love somebody, you’ll also tell them not to do drugs.”

The strategy is based on making existing anti-drug programs more efficient and reducing public tolerance for drug use, White House drug policy director John Walters said in an interview.

“We have to undermine the cynicism that people are always going to use drugs at roughly the same amount that they’re using now. That’s not true. And my goal is to demonstrate that’s not true,” he said.

Walters’ priorities include identifying drug users who need treatment but are unlikely to seek it; helping recovering addicts stay clean; disrupting money laundering networks; and gleaning better intelligence about drug distribution networks so they can be broken up.

The report comes two months after Walters was confirmed for the Cabinet-level post over the objections of some top Democrats.

Bush’s proposed budget for 2003 includes $19.2 billion in anti-drug spending, 2 percent increase over this year.

He wants $644 million for the Safe and Drug-Free Schools Program, which encourages drug-prevention among young people and $731 million to fight drug trafficking in the Andes.

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