Adderall Follow-Up Pitch

The story I am interested in submitting is a follow-up to the Adderall story we wrote last month. I would like to give readers a sense of the different approaches people are taking to address this issue. In the November 18 Spokesman editorial, the writer called for “A combination of [public education campaigns] and monitoring programs … to stem the rising tide of prescription drug abuse.” This article will show that some of these strategies are in place or at least in the beginning stages. I think this will be a shorter article, around 500 words. The areas I want to look at are research, education and prevention, and legislation. There are two researchers at WSU currently conducting studies about prescription drug abuse at WSU, one of which I have been in contact with, and we have a tentative interview set for after he gets his results. I am working on getting an interview with a woman in Colfax who received a grant to work on education and prevention of prescription drug abuse. I have already spoken to Patricia Maarhuis with our Alcohol and Drug Abuse and Counseling Services about the school’s education and prevention campaigns. Also, I have an interview later this week to speak with Rob McKenna about his prevention programs and legislative work on the issue, which we briefly touched on in the first article. We also talked about the drug monitoring program in the first article sidebar, but I will include a note on that as well. Also, I plan to talk to pharmacists and/or doctors about any ways they are currently working to prevent ‘doctor shopping’, fraudulent prescriptions and fake symptoms.