Dubai Police Launch Anti-Drug Campaign In School

Dubai Schools without Drugs Campaign

The Dubai Police, on Tuesday, launched a major awareness campaign in schools on the harmful effects of hallucinatory and other narcotic drugs.

The launch was also attended by Dr Jasim Khalil Merza, Director of the Awareness Department at the police’s General Department of Security Services; Sam Hayes, Vice-Consul at the British Embassy in Dubai; and Sina M. Giachetti, Assistant Attaché, Drug Enforcement Administration, United States Department of Justice.

The campaign, being carried out by the police’s General Department of Community Service with the slogan ‘Schools without Drugs’, aims to spread awareness among students in Grade 7 to 12. It will run throughout the 2013-2014 school year.

Schools must assume the vital role of protecting students from the use of drugs by spreading awareness also among parents and giving training to teachers to convey the security and drug awareness messages, said Lieutenant-Colonel Dr Juma Sultan Al Shamsi, Director of the Awareness and Protection Division at the General Department of Anti-Narcotics.

LT-Col Dr Al Shamsi said 90 percent of drug addicts were influenced by bad friends, and some were using pills prescribed by doctors. The Dubai Police had now designed an electronic system to control drug use.

The campaign will spread awareness through the media by drafting in specialist columns, interviews with addicted juveniles and their parents on the impact of drug use, special programmes on Noor Dubai radio channel and Sharjah Police’s radio programme ‘Aman biladi’ and other programmes in coordination with some TV channels. It will also send out the campaign messages through social media networks and SMSes and postthem on websites.

The police will also rope in social and youth clubs, organise workshops, send SMSes to parents urging them to keep a close watch on their children, enlist preachers in mosques to speak in sermons about the harmful effects of drugs, besides distributing brochures, posting the campaign theme on ATM machines in cooperation with the banks and distributing gifts to students.

Dr Khalil Merza said that curiosity was the first reason for teenagers to try out hallucinatory pills.

Hayes thanked the Dubai Police for inviting the British Embassy to join the campaign.

“It is quite interesting to enrich the awareness programme. Earlier, we had worked with the Dubai Police and the Shaikh Mohammed Centre for Cultural Understanding to educate students about drugs and the UAE culture,” he said.

“This time again, we are keen to participate in the activities to convey the awareness messages about the dangerous effects of narcotics. There are around 100,000 Britons living in Dubai, so we are keen to participate in the campaign to spread awareness among British students about the negative impacts of drug use and the UAE legislation. We will visit and coordinate with schools in spreading awareness using different methods to prevent drug use.”