No one wants to read about drug addiction, abuse, overdose numbers and young death. Why should they? Why should anyone who is steady, healthy and cogent enough to be combing a newspaper, or scanning news on their iPhone care much about someone who — all the world assumes — lost their own future, made avoidable mistakes? Not my lane. Not my worry. Not my world, right? Wrong.

Never before in American history has our country faced a drug abuse, drug crime, and drug overdose crisis of the magnitude now confronting our society. Last week, the Centers for Disease Control (CDC), within the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS), announced that more than 50,000 Americans last year died from drug overdoses. That is a surge of death around us.

What child is this?  It is America’s child, and America’s childhood.  How is it that we have, collectively, forgotten to keep watch over those entrusted to our watch – especially from high office?  Last year, 47,055 Americans, most of them young, were lost to drug abuse – just statistics now.  Why?   

As California follows along with other states legalizing recreational marijuana, there’s at least one local voice trying to be heard through the thickening smoke.

Lynn Fox, Ph.D, founder of Powerful Teachers and Parents, has been waging her own war against marijuana for decades. With society deeming the drug more acceptable and legalization sweeping the nation, she feels her message is more urgent than ever.

“It’s a billion-dollar industry,” says Dr. Fox. “And all of this is about the money.”

A new report, released today by the office of the U.S. Surgeon General, adds to the mounting body of scientific evidence highlighting the dangers of marijuana use and emphasizing prevention as essential for protecting youth.

Nine states are carrying measures to legalize marijuana on the Nov. 8 ballot — California, Nevada, Maine, Arizona, Massachusetts, Florida, Arkansas, Montana, and North Dakota. Pot peddlers claim the industry will boost jobs and grow the economy.

But the marijuana industry isn’t interested in the occasional or casual adult user. Like any drug industry, this group is interested in addicts — people who start using early and make it a lifetime habit. Maybe that’s why they don’t care about how their drugs are affecting babies — and why they occasionally take measures to market their products to pregnant women.

The negative effects of prolonged use of marijuana on the human brain is well documented. Dr. Daniel Amen’s has provided Brain Scans of Youth and what their brain looks like when using different drugs at different ages and for different length of times.