Special to the Post

YSUP Rowan (pronounced “WISE-UP Rowan”) is teaming up with The Medicine Shoppe, one of its local community partners, to help increase community awareness about the coalition’s efforts to prevent and reduce youth substance use.

Liz Tennent, project director, and Teresa Casmus, owner/pharmacist of The Medicine Shoppe, agreed that May was a great time to start a sticker campaign.

All the store bags distributed to customers include the YSUP logo, website and phone number. They hope to reach parents, youth and a larger audience who will be informed and engaged with YSUP Rowan.

May 12-18 was National Substance Use Awareness Week, which helped in jump-starting the sticker campaign into the summer months.

“Research clearly shows that summer is a risky time for youth substance use,” Tennent said in a press release. “An average of 5,000 youth will smoke cigarettes for the first time; more than 11,000 teens ages 12 to 17 will use alcohol for the first time; and over 4,500 youth start using marijuana for the first time in June and July.”

Those statistics are from the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration’s “Monthly Variation in Substance Use Initiation Among Adolescents.”

“Youth really need to grasp and understand the impact of substance abuse,” Casmus said. “It can preclude you from many professions and opportunities. You will be required to complete a background check and, in many cases, random drug testing. If you have a record of substance use, it will greatly limit your choices for the present and for your future.”

Local college students working at The Medicine Shoppe for the summer agreed with Casmus.

Joe Harrison is a junior at Belmont Abbey studying sports medicine and business administration. Bill Fisher, a senior at Salisbury High, will attend N.C. State in the fall for engineering.

Will Casmus, a data analytics major, is a junior at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. Dakotah Insley, a junior health sciences major, attends Furman University.

While putting labels on the customer bags, the students shared their opinion about local substance use issues in Rowan County. All employees, including part-time young people, receive extensive training and methamphetamine training.

Insley, whose mother is a former substance use counselor, is passionate about this issue. At Furman, one of her required public health courses during the semester focused on substance use and healthy habits.

“We spent an entire unit on JUULS and vaping.” said Insley. “It was very relevant and enlightening. The information was current and really captured our attention. A course like this would be great for high school students.”

Casmus feels strongly about education and separating facts from fiction, especially when it comes to preventing and reducing youth substance use.

“We want to educate all our employees and customers,” she said.  Whatever we can do to support YSUP Rowan’s mission is exactly what our pharmacy does. We are all in.”

To learn more about or to volunteer with YSUP Rowan, contact Liz Tennent at Liz@RowanYSB.com or call 704-633-5636, ext. 106.