Hope on United Nations Day Against Drug Abuse and Illicit Trafficking Teen Challenge & Foundation for a Drug Free World in Action

BOSTON – As the Patch editors rightfully covered “Chaos at TD Garden Techno Concert; 80+ Treated After Booze, Drug Use”,  drug awareness activists were working to make positive change during the UN’s Day Against Drug Abuse and Illicit Trafficking that falls on June 26th every year.

While hitting a Starbucks facing us from across the Love that Dirty Water River on Memorial Drive in Cambridge,  I dropped a buck in a Teen Challenge donation box. I personally like this organization as they help addicts to recover without filling them up with other opiates such as methadone and Suboxone.

I started chatting with two of their formerly addicted volunteers about the increasing amount of drug dealing around Massachusetts Avenue and from Albany to Washington Streets in Boston’s South End. This is a section of Boston littered with methadone centers and Suboxone-prescribing doctors. According to one of the volunteers, Robert, “Methadone and Suboxone are just legal opiates that keep people addicted. It’s crazy to use these.”

I also contacted Darren Tessitore, New England Director of Foundation for a Drug Free World. FDFW is a program that focuses on drug awareness in order to reduce the illicit drug demand from children by making them aware of the dangers of drugs that the dealers hide from them. Their material is used in schools, and by police and driver’s education classes throughout the US.

“To us, every day is about protecting children against future drug abuse by giving them knowledge from credible research and the testimonials of former drug abusers who have been harmed,” said Tessitore. “I am very pleased that the United Nations is also pushing this message.”