National Substance Use Primary Prevention Month, 2026
This National Substance Use Primary Prevention Month, we renew our pledge to safeguard our children, friends, families, and communities from the devastating reach of illicit drugs by stopping addiction before it ever begins.
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BY THE PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA
A PROCLAMATION
This National Substance Use Primary Prevention Month, we renew our pledge to safeguard our children, friends, families, and communities from the devastating reach of illicit drugs by stopping addiction before it ever begins.
Substance abuse remains among the gravest threats confronting our country, poisoning neighborhoods, shattering families, and destroying lives filled with promise. Our Nation’s youth stand among the most targeted and vulnerable, susceptible at an impressionable age to influences that can draw them into a life-threatening cycle of dependency. Every young life claimed by this scourge represents a future torn from our national story, a tragedy whose grief echoes throughout households and hometowns.
My Administration has confronted this crisis with unwavering resolve to protect American lives. I proudly signed the HALT Fentanyl Act into law, permanently classifying fentanyl-related substances as Schedule I drugs, and I designated nearly a dozen cartels as foreign terrorist organizations. Our southern border now stands as the most secure in American history, stopping the flood of illegal aliens, deadly narcotics, and criminal traffickers before they can infiltrate our communities. These achievements sever the pipeline that delivers poison to our streets and our schools, forming one of the most powerful safeguards against substance abuse our Nation has ever known.
Stopping drug use before it starts remains the best path to spare families the crippling disease of addiction. For the first time in American history, my 2026 National Drug Control Strategy establishes a framework that places quality, evidence-based prevention at the center of our national response, uniting schools, communities, and houses of worship in a single mission. While radical lunatics pass out needles, my Administration is cleaning up our streets and preventing addiction before it starts. Education delivered through trusted voices — parents, teachers, coaches, pastors, and neighbors — is one of the strongest defenses against substance abuse, reaching young hearts and minds long before the dealers and their poisons ever can. Student drug abstention rates have already climbed to record-breaking levels under this historic effort, marking a major victory in our mission to protect young Americans.