Yogyakarta testing students for drugs

Slamet Susanto, Yogyakarta

The Yogyakarta city administration has began taking random urine samples from at least 1,000 high school and university students to monitor the circulation of illegal drugs.

The tests were intended to assess the spread of drugs in the city so a policy could be formulated to fight drug dealing and drug use, Yogyakarta Mayor Herry Zudianto said on Wednesday.

At present, crime statistics indicate the circulation of illegal drugs among students in Yogyakarta has significantly increased through the years. The university town is ranked second after Jakarta for the number of drug-related arrests in the municipality.

By May this year, the number of drug arrests by police in Yogyakarta stood at 74. There were 245 arrests recorded last year and 208 arrests in 2002.

Herry said the urine samples were part of a plan to combat drug abuse among the students, whom he said were the nation's future.

The tests were not meant to judge students who tested positive to using drugs because they were only the victims of drug dealers, he said.

"We will give advice and directions to students addicted to drugs. They are only victims who need to be saved," he said.

Yogyakarta education office student affairs program head Aji Baskoro said the tests would also affect university students.

"We will facilitate a meeting with all higher learning institution rectors in Yogyakarta to wage war on drugs," he told The Jakarta Post.

The next step would be to conduct random urine tests on the students in conjunction with the authorities.

"If they are positively using drugs, we leave it to their respective universities to mete out sanctions. But we will receive drug addicts from all universities for rehabilitation," he explained.

Herry said if the samples of the first 1,000 students showed many had tested positive, the administration would continue with the tests. "But if not, we will stop running them," he said.

He said the results of every test sample would be kept confidential to avoid conflicts between students and social discrimination against those who tested positive.

"The municipality has allocated funds of Rp 60,000 (US$7.00) to Rp 75,000" to carry out each urine sample, he said.

Yogyakarta's Wirosaban General Hospital director Mulyoharto said the hospital tested 240 students on the first day of the scheme on Wednesday.

"We are visiting schools and randomly choosing students. We will continue this until the target of 1,000 students is met," he said.