Parents, schools and the government face the serious task of dealing with a crisis that is taking on epidemic proportions Melinda Ferguson The use of illegal substances among schoolchildren and teenagers has increased about fivefold over the past six years. According to the latest figures available from the South African Police Service, more than 60% are exposed, experimenting or addicted in urban high schools in Gauteng. The police say that some in areas the figure is as high as 95%. In 1994 only 5% to 10% of schoolchildren in the province were affected, says Michelle Ginsberg, a representative of Drugwise, an NGO specialising in combating drug use in schools. Ginsberg says that while the statistics refer to Gauteng, she believes there are similar trends across the country. “There has been an explosion of drugs in schools in the last four to five years,” says Dr Michael Niss, a clinical psychologist with a special interest in addiction. “It is a very prevalent problem and it is growing. Kids are going to school stoned, they are using drugs before, during and after school.”
Miss S, a teacher and deputy principal of a high school in the south of Johannesburg (who wishes to remain anonymous), believes that “there is no school without a drug problem. If people don’t intervene and deal with the crisis soon, we are looking at an educational loss to our youth where the apartheid era’s schooling will pale in significance.” Miss S, along with the rest of the people quoted in this article, appeared in an expos’ on drugs in schools on e.tv’s current affairs programme Third Degree on Thursday night. “Everyone’s using drugs,” says Nick, a 17- year-old schoolboy heroin addict. “Life is crap. People don’t care and teachers really don’t have a clue what’s going on. Almost all my friends are doing something. I do heroin so I don’t have to feel the pain of being alive.” Marianne, a 17-year-old pupil and former cocaine and ecstasy addict at an affluent private school in Johannesburg, reckons that almost everyone she knows is doing drugs. “Ninety percent of my school is using,” she reckons. “Everyone knows a dealer, you can get hold of drugs wherever you are, whatever you want. People come to school rushing, tripping.”
Ecstasy, dagga and drugs like cocaine, crack and heroin seem to have become an integral part of youth culture. “The use of drugs has become completely normalised,” says Niss. “Where they were once seen as a ‘they’ culture, it’s now what we’re doing. Almost all kids are exposed just by going to school. And if everyone is doing it, then it must be okay.” With the growth and commercialisation of rave culture, hard drugs have become hugely attractive and available to the youth. “In the rave culture it’s almost insisted on to use drugs. It’s become de rigueur,” says Alex Hamlyn, head of treatment at Houghton House Recovery Centre. Modern-day icons like Kurt Cobain and River Phoenix, who died in drug-related incidents, also play a role in normalising drugs. “Teenagers idealise and identify with these figures,” says Hamlyn. “They are seen as romantic and glamorous, reflecting society’s ideals. The fact that they die young and gorgeous adds to their allure. But there are obvious serious consequences to Cobain’s lifestyle – he blew his head off.” Hamlyn believes that children are experiencing serious problematic drug usage at a far earlier age. Recently he had enquiries for treatment of a 10-year-old heroin addict. Cathy Vos, director of the rehabilitation centre Horizon Clinic, estimates that half of the 15- to 18-year-old patients admitted to the centre since December 1999 have been heroin users. Miss S estimates that 75% of the pupils in her school come from single-parent homes. “The family unit has become severely dysfunctional. There is either a working mother or a working father; children’s self- esteem is at an all-time low. They are unmotivated; there is no care or control. Kids are left to their own devices. The television or the peer group has become the surrogate parent.” Miss S believes that a combination of extreme peer pressure and availability of drugs are contributing to what she believes is an epidemic.
“Kids can buy drugs within 50m of the school. Kids are dealing drugs in the schools. Drugs are coming on to the school grounds. They are not sold in the tuckshop.” Hamlyn says: “The economic gateway into South Africa has been opened. The country is being flooded with all sorts of things, a lot of it is positive stuff, but the downside is that hard drugs are flooding in. It’s caught people off guard. There were no contingency plans to deal with it.” “What we are seeing is the emergence of a generation of people who are dysfunctional as a result of substance abuse and addiction,” says Niss. “They are emotionally unable to cope. with life. We’re already seeing the gaps. There is emotional and intellectual fallout. There is demotivation, a sense of no future. Kids are in desperate need of attention. But they have nowhere to go.” Hamlyn believes that a by-product of substance abuse is that a person will not develop normal healthy coping skills. “An addict will say, ‘If I’ve got an exam tomorrow, I’ll smoke a joint. If I fail that exam, I’ll smoke a joint and if I get kicked out of school, I’ll smoke a really fat joint, it’s okay.’ Emotional growth is stunted.” Of more than 20 Gauteng schools, ranging from affluent private schools to lower-middle- class high schools, only two schools were prepared to acknowledge the possibility of a drug problem in their respective schools. Although Bheki Khumalo, a representative of the Ministry of Education, encouraged schools to be open-minded and speak to the media, the response was a dismal one. The fear of the stigma of being branded a school with a drug problem evoked responses like: “We’re too busy”, or “We don’t have a problem in our school.”
With so few schools willing to confront a glaringly obvious crisis, solutions and answers seem to be few and far between.
‘Silence about drug use is couched in the belief that if we don’t talk about it, it doesn’t exist. It is a protection, a type of defence against issues that we can’t deal with. Schools are the best places to teach children to deal with their problems,” says Niss.
“There is no other system that lends itself so well to a community teaching the problems of the community.” Authorities like parents, schools and the government are faced with the serious and challenging task of recognising and dealing with a crisis that is taking on seemingly epidemic proportions. “There has to be a response to kids who need help. Expelling a child with drug issues is not the answer. It’s putting out fires, the problem doesn’t go away. A child must be able to say ‘I have a problem’ and be safe with it.”
Niss concludes: “What we’re saving in schools now through a system of denial will cost us later in society.” Melinda Ferguson was a researcher for the e.tv documentary