Are Anti-Drug ads a big waste?

The government has yet to prove that its $200 million-a-year media campaign is effective, leading to all sorts of carping The White House Office of National Drug Control Policy on Oct. 4 chose a new advertising agency, Foote Cone & Belding, to lead its $200 million-per-year anti-drug advertising effort aimed at parents and children. The previous agency, Ogilvy & Mather, was accused of overbilling the government, but that’s hardly the only controversy dogging the government’s six-year-old anti-drug ad effort. The ONDCP, headed by federal drug czar John Walters, spends its ad budget buying time, space, and public-relation services for anti-drug ads and promotions warning youngsters about the ills of pot, ecstasy, glue-sniffing, and other such substances. The agency also urges parents to monitor kids for drug use. For each ad paid the ONDCP buys with tax dollars, media companies contribute a matching ad. It sounds like a public-service "slam dunk" in current Beltway-speak, but the General Accounting Office and Congress are studying whether any link can be made between the ads and declining drug use. So far, the only study that tried to assess this found no connection and concluded that the campaign may actually backfire: The more ads some kids see, the more likely they are to try pot.