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For Belize, one of the focuses has to be the abuse of that legal drug alcohol. Esner Vellos of the Drug Council explains:..

Esner Vellos, Director NDACC
"At this point one of the issues that we are addressing is the consumption of alcohol. In 2011 when we compile our data we found out that the highest number of consumption of illicit and licit drugs is alcohol. Therefore the National Drug Abuse Control Council is making sure that we will be able to design programs that will be able to target the consumption of alcohol."

"In terms of at what age range or who are the ones that are consuming alcohol - we have found out that it's our young people. Therefore we are doing different kinds of programs in our high schools and primary schools so that we will be able to target and reduce the initiation of consumption of alcohol through the insight program."

"Second in line in terms of consumption we see that we have a high increase of the consumption of marijuana at the national level and also tobacco. However, if we zoom it in, in terms of the different geographical regions then the picture changes a little bit. In terms for example in the northern districts there is a high increase in terms of the consumption of alcohol. However if we zoom it in the city or the Belize District area, we see that the major consumption is marijuana."

Beverly Reynolds, Program Manager, CARICOM Human/Soc. Dev, Directorate
"Medical research is now showing that substance addiction is a medical condition; it can be treated. So it's not a matter now of just grabbing people and locking them up, we've got to think about other alternatives and what's the best way that you can facilitate recovery in somebody who has this problem."

The meeting is held under the theme "Building Human Resources in Drug Demand Reduction for Sustainable Development".