In their ongoing efforts to decrease substance abuse and related behaviors by promoting healthy choices in Decatur County, the county’s Community Action Coalition (CAC) invited Indiana’s Drug Enforcement Agency (DEA) assistant special agent in charge Dennis Wichern to the group’s monthly meeting on Thursday.

Wichern is a DEA agent out of Indianapolis who brought his expertise and knowledge of drugs and drug trafficking to the ears of the Decatur County CAC. Specifically, Wichern provided information about protecting children, what kinds of drug abuse is seen in Indiana and ways the local community can safeguard kids.

During the last week of October, area school kids will be able to participate in Red Ribbon Week - an alcohol, tobacco and other drug prevention awareness campaign. According to Wichern, Red Ribbon began in 1985, when DEA agent Enrique “Kiki” Camerana was kidnapped, tortured and murdered by drug traffickers. When citizens in his hometown began donning red ribbons in his honor, the movement was born.

“The program touches 80 million kids a year,” Wichern said.

The DEA works to complement and support the program while churches, schools, posters and community events help spread the message.

But the DEA does more than support programs. Its mission is to enforce laws regarding controlled substances.

“We try and do our best, but we’ve got a long way to go,” Wicher said.

The largest problems facing Indiana and the state’s DEA are influxes of meth and incoming drugs from Mexican poly drug organizations. As anyone who buys the nasal decongestant pseudoephedrine may know, the substance is used in combination with other chemicals to make meth. Fortunately, Wichern explained, meth has become increasingly more difficult to buy in bulk, largely thanks to tightening restrictions on purchases of pseudoephedrine.

But some still manage to make its way to U.S. borders. Small meth labs are cropping up all over the country, and large amounts of pseudoephedrine make their way to America from China. While China provides the pseudoephedrine, most of the makers of meth come from Mexico. One recent drug bust netted more than $207 million in Mexico City, when DEA agents busted a Chinese businessman selling pseudoephedrine in large quantities to drug makers.

“Meth really has a way of devastating people,” Wichern said.

Though meth provides the biggest obstacles to overcome, drugs like cocaine and heroin still cause problems. One of the biggest misconceptions about heroin in America, Wicher said, is that it comes from opium poppies grown in Afghanistan. The fact is that most of Afghanistan’s homegrown opium goes to Europe. Most heroin in the United States comes from South American drug cartels.

According to Wichern, that is where smuggling plays a role. One case from a few years ago saw drug runners smuggling heroin on the insides of living puppies.

“They have weird ways to get it in the country,” he said.

Wichern provided the CAC with even more alarming facts and statistics. Nearly half of the people who get pulled over for reckelss driving are not drunk, but rather under the influence of marijuana, he said.

The most shocking trend, however, remains the rise of prescription drug abuse. Drug related emergency room visits stem mostly from abuse of pharmaceuticals, instead of cocaine and other drugs.

Still, there are ways to combat the statistics, Wichern noted. Education and prevention tactics are the best, he said. Courts prosecuting drug cases and frequent drug testing are other beneficial methods.

For a community like Decatur County, Wichern recommended educating, communicating and safeguarding as the most effective prevention principles.

“A balanced drug policy is the most effective,” he said.

According to Wichern, 34 percent of prescription drug abusing kids get their supply from the home medicine cabinet. To counter this, Wichern encouraged significant parental engagement in childrens’ lives.