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Pingtan youths urged to stay away from drugs

( chinadaily.com.cn )

Updated: 2014-03-21

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Pingtan youths urged to stay away from drugs

Many of the young drug addicts don't realize how much harm the drugs are doing. [english.pingtan.gov]

Police in Pingtan county, East China's Fujian province, has called on local young people to say no to narcotic drugs.

Concerns over a growing number of young drug addicts in Pingtan became more serious after police cracked down on three drug cases on March 5, with all 11 members of the drug ring being teens 15 to 19.

The youngest one was all smiles in front of the camera when she got caught.

A whopping 80 percent of Pingtan's drug addicts are young people, according to police.

"Most of the new drug users are minors. We've got 1,266 of them under 30 years old since 2000," said Lin Chunqun, a policeman with the local anti-drug brigade.

Many of the young drug addicts don't realize how much harm the drugs are doing. They just do it for fun, police said.

The biggest reason behind the drug use by youngsters is the lack of care and education from their families, along with insufficient knowledge of the drugs, Lin said.

"Some of them think doing meth is just fashionable. And they share it with friends. Those wrong conceptions and knowledge must be corrected," he said.

Addiction to drugs also undermines the health condition of the children, he added.

Police urged society and parents to make better drug-prevention efforts, educate children on the issue and help them stay away from drugs.

Edited by Chen Zhilin and Nelly Min