The southwest border is a major focus of drug policy, but there are also considerable challenges on the northern border.

Disrupt Surveillance Operations of Drug-Trafficking Organization(s)(DTO): Drug traffickers dedicate significant resources to monitor enforcement operations of United States agencies.

The Joint Interagency Task Force South (JIATFS), a DOD component of U.S. Southern Command, coordinates and directs detection and monitoring of all illicit drug-trafficking activities in the Transit Zone.

Federal, State, local, and tribal law enforcement officers have valuable knowledge, experience, and energy to contribute to community prevention efforts.

The family medicine cabinet is increasingly a source of drugs that are abused (e.g., the pain pill prescription that was never finished, the tranquilizers that are used occasionally).

Proper and safe prescribing of medications rests on a triangle of responsibility comprising the patient, the prescriber, and the pharmacist.

In the past decade, numerous communities have taken a stand to stop open-air drug markets, not by making mass arrests, but rather by implementing powerful, positive, restorative justice techniques.

Some jurisdictions have allowed offenders with a drug use disorder, upon arrest, to be immediately diverted to alternative programs.

Treatment Alternatives for Safe Communities (TASC) offers a state-level model for how intensive case management of drug offenders might work to reduce crime and incarceration and support reentry programs.

Fiscal and public safety concerns have motivated State and local policymakers to consider alternatives to incarceration that protect public safety, provide drug treatment, and avoid the costs and consequences of long-term incarceration.

Community corrections programs can increase public safety, promote public health, and cut costs.

The Second Chance Act authorizes the provision of treatment, employment assistance, housing, family programming, mentoring, victims support, expanded probation and parole supervision, and other services that can help reduce recidivism.

BJS reports that about 735,000 offenders were released from State and Federal prisons in 2008.

Federal funding for drug law enforcement task forces enables State and local law enforcement agencies to participate in joint investigations, promotes local and regional coordination, and helps to minimize duplication of effort.

Federal agencies, often working in close partnership with Mexico, have produced a large volume of information about Mexico-based drug-trafficking organizations.

There are a host of challenges unique to tribal lands. Many Indian tribes are at high risk from illegal drug trafficking, production, and consumption because these tribes are located in geographically remote areas and suffer from a lack of economic development.

Current Federal and most State laws to control pseudoephedrine, the key ingredient needed to make the most powerful form of methamphetamine, are no longer as effective in addressing the serious threat posed by domestic methamphetamine production as they once were.

Marijuana trafficking is prevalent across the Nation, with both domestic and foreign sources of supply. California, Hawaii, Kentucky, Oregon, Tennessee, Washington, and West Virginia are considered the top seven (M7) states for marijuana cultivation.

Bulk seizures of currency, regardless of who makes the seizure or where it is made, should be treated, to the extent allowable by law, as drugs or other contraband are treated.

The key to countering international drug trafficking is a concerted and synchronized approach to identifying the ever-changing vulnerabilities inherent to drug production and trafficking organizations.

Violent, well-funded organizations cannot be eliminated unless their leadership core is identified and brought to justice.

Tabulation of drug seizures is the foundation for reporting statistics on the trends, activities, and patterns related to drug supply reduction policy.

As with drunk driving, visible enhanced enforcement has a powerful preventive effect. The Drug Evaluation and Classification Program is a standardized, systematic method

A second requirement for reaching our goals is for States to play a more active role in helping communities prepare to implement prevention initiatives.

Science is a critical ally in efforts to prevent youth substance use, yet scientific work is not always precisely aligned with the threats communities face.

There are several important scientific issues that must be resolved to establish effective policies and laws on drugged driving.

In 2007, the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services approved reimbursement codes and encouraged state-level funding for physicians and other health care workers to be reimbursed for performing SBIRT.

Prescription of opioids is an increasing challenge for clinicians, who have to weigh the substantial pain relief these medications can provide against the potential for dependence, abuse, and diversion.

Although IHS serves a much smaller population than CHCs, the need for addiction treatment is so great among American Indians and Alaska Natives that it requires an organized, aggressive response.

The effectiveness of addiction treatment has been hampered by the limited range of available FDA-approved medications relative to other chronic medical disorders.

Overdoses, particularly from opiates, are a growing national crisis, and health care providers need to be able to recognize and intervene in overdose emergencies.

Access to Recovery (ATR) is an innovative program that provides drug-addicted individuals vouchers with which they can purchase clinical treatment and recovery support services, including transitional housing, child care, transportation to work or to recovery mutual help group meetings, peer counseling, and aids to employment restoration (e.g., the purchase of a pair of work boots).

Years of research have demonstrated that heavy users, a minority of the drug using population, consume a disproportionately large share of illegal drugs.

DAWN provides national and local-area estimates of drug-related emergency department visits, and drug-related mortality.

DASIS consists of two data sets: the Treatment Episode Data Set (TEDS) and the National Survey on Substance Abuse Treatment Services (N-SSATS).

National indicators may bear little resemblance to what is happening in any individual community.

ODNI, DOJ, and DHS will convene all interagency intelligence organizations to marshal their expertise on drug-trafficking organizations, their vulnerabilities, and mechanisms to attack these vulnerabilities.

The Drug Free Communities Support program is a signature effort to bring a broad range of community stakeholders together to prevent youth drug, alcohol, and tobacco use.

Mentoring can play a critical role in a child’s development. Data indicate that mentoring programs can help young people, including those with incarcerated parents or

During the Strategy consultation process, many law enforcement professionals indicated that information on the effectiveness of various prevention strategies and programs is not easily available.

State laws regarding impaired driving are varied, but most State codes do not contain a separate offense for driving under the influence of drugs (DUID).

There has been insufficient effort to educate all relevant stakeholders, including government agencies, parents, schools, faith communities, community coalitions, and medical professionals, about the serious threat posed by drugged driving.

The National Quality Forum (NQF) is a voluntary public-private partnership that brings together diverse health care stakeholders in an effort to develop a common vision for health care quality improvement.

Consistent with the Presidential Study Directive – Strengthening Our Military Families, ONDCP will lead an interagency effort to identify recovery support services

ONDCP, in partnership with DOD, VA, HHS/SAMHSA, DOJ, and other stakeholders, is taking steps to address Veterans within the criminal justice system.

On June 5, 2009, Attorney General Holder, DHS Secretary Napolitano, and ONDCP Director Kerlikowske released the Southwest Border Strategy, which aims to stem the flow of illegal drugs and their illicit proceeds across the southwest border and reduce associated crime and violence in the region.

This Administration established a Counternarcotics Working Group under the Bilateral Presidential Commission co-chaired by ONDCP Director Gil Kerlikowske and Russian Federal Drug Control Service (FSKN) Director Viktor Ivanov.

Economic analyses of drug use and drug markets are essential to assessing the effectiveness and cost-effectiveness of drug control policies and programs.

The United States Government produces annual estimates of illicit crop cultivation and illicit drug production in key source countries around the world in an effort to frame the threat of illicit drugs to the United States and its allies.

The United States will actively cooperate with those partner nations that are most directly victimized by drug production that flows toward the United States, that are most at risk from international drug-trafficking organizations, and that are committed to counterdrug efforts and the rule of law.

In spite of decades of research demonstrating the cost-effectiveness of drug treatment, the vast majority of countries lack sufficient infrastructure to provide quality treatment services to the millions of individuals in need.

Disrupting the illicit narcotics trade in Afghanistan is essential to ensuring Afghanistan’s future security, stability, and rule of law; depriving the Taliban of opium trade profits; and reducing the flow of illegal opiates to partner nations in Europe and Asia.

Central American and Caribbean nations are at great risk for drug trafficking, production, and abuse.

To sustain and expand on past United States programs for law enforcement, rule of law, human rights, and economic and social development initiated with Merida Initiative funding, the United States has established the Central American Regional Security Initiative (CARSI).

Drug detection, monitoring, interdiction, and apprehension are divided into Source, Transit, and Arrival Zones.

The VA has made major advances in the care of veterans who have substance use disorders, including expanded addiction treatment, primary care-based screening and intervention, path-breaking research on psychosocial and medication-based treatments, and integration of addiction treatment-based information and services into the broader health care system.