Attitudes of high school students toward drug education

In Nigeria, there is an indiscriminate sale of drugs by druggists or pharmacists, patent medicine dealers and street vendors and hawkers whose stores, to say the least, are manned by unqualified people. There is no strict control over the production and distribution of narcotic drugs. The danger about these sources of drug is that they lack the medical supervision that is an integral part of drug education. Consequently, drug education of the students is an important matter which must be of great concern to parents and governments with their relevant agencies. There is need, however, for a better understanding of student attitudes about drug education in school. Studies have shown that measures of specific attitudes-towards-act are a better predictor of intentions and subsequent behaviours than attitudes towards objects [1-3]. The present study examined Nigerian student attitudes towards drug education. Review of the pertinent literature revealed that attention has been given throughout the world to abuse and misuse of drugs among the youths. Researchers in Nigeria have followed suit in their attempt to tackle the same problem. For example, Oshodi [4] reported a large scale use of amphetamines by young and old farmers and labourers around the northern borders of Nigeria. Oviasu [5] reported that all his 269 patients under age 25 except one, seen at the Uselu Nervous Disease Clinic in Benin City, Nigeria from January 1969 to December 1972 abuse cannabis. Likewise Ogunremi et al. [6] reported that 25% of their respondents had used Indian hemp (cannabis) and one-third of these continued to use drugs.(ABSTRACT TRUNCATED AT 250 WORDS)