Alcohol, pot, speed popular with local kids

Of all the drugs that kids are doing these days, alcohol remains the single most abused substance, says Neal Cash, executive director of CODAC Behavioral Health Services.

``You can't separate it from using drugs,'' says Cash. ``The kids who are binge-drinking on the weekends are also likely to be the ones using marijuana.''

After alcohol and marijuana, the most popular illicit drug in Tucson is methamphetamines - a stimulant made from over-the-counter medications, then smoked, snorted or injected.

Also known as speed, crank or crystal meth, its use among adolescents is staggering.

In 1995, 17 percent of Arizona high school seniors reported using methamphetamines - four times the national average for that age group.

Some 16 percent of 10th-graders and 11 percent of eighth-graders in Arizona also reported using the drug, according to Drug Strategies, a Washington, D.C.-based research institute.

LSD, cocaine and Rohypnol - a sedative so powerful when combined with other drugs that it's known as the ``date-rape drug'' - round out the top illicit drugs among Tucson teens, say drug-abuse counselors.

And while both boys and girls are doing drugs, it's the boys who tend to wind up in treatment centers in greater numbers.

``Plenty of girls are using, but they're not getting caught,'' says Steve Barcanic, team leader for the Seven Challenges program at PACT/Providence. ``Boys are more into risk-taking.''

For girls who are using, crystal meth is the drug of choice, says Wendy Pipentacos, drug-treatment therapist with the Seven Challenges program used by PACT/Providence.

She also sees a lot of girls using marijuana and LSD. ``It's a nostalgia trend to the '60s - and they weren't even born.''

Today's pot, however, bears little resemblance to what may have been floating around at Woodstock.

``Marijuana today is very, very potent,'' says Cash. ``There's no comparison to that of 20 years ago.''

Ben Weber, primary adolescent therapist for the treatment center Cottonwood de Tucson, also sees kids who rationalize using ``natural'' drugs, such as peyote, jimson weed and mushrooms.

``Kids say it's natural. I tell them, `So is poison ivy. But I don't see you smoking that,' '' says Weber.

As might be expected among status-conscious teens, some drugs are just too uncool to use.

``We get a few kids on crack, not many,'' says Deborah Brook, another Seven Challenges counselor with PACT/Providence. ``It's seen as a ghetto drug.''

Same for the inhalants.

``We do get some in the younger kids and in some sections of town,'' says Brook. ``It's called huffing. And it's really looked down on by others. Kids do it because it's cheaper.''