Prime Minister Marcel Ciolacu said on Tuesday that drug use in schools is on the rise, adding that he will discuss with Minister of the Interior Catalin Predoiu setting a coherent program in place by the start of the school year to address this problem, write Agerpres.

„Bullying or violence are not yet a widespread plague, instead the rates of drug use in schools are starting to increase and we must not hide this, we must talk about it, we need psychologists in education, in schools, to help the children who have fallen to this temptation, because we are talking about children and teenagers. They must be helped to overcome this as quickly as possible. They are not the society’s pariahs, development comes with this kind of things too. The Romanian state has the obligation to step in and make every effort. We will also have a discussion with the Interior minister and I think that by September 15, or when the new school year begins, we will have a coherent program in place as regards the use of drugs in schools, especially in crowded urban areas,” Ciolacu said at premises of the Education Ministry after a working meeting with Minister Ligia Deca.

He also suggested that the Ministries of Education and the Interior should use this school holiday period to hammer out solutions for the prevention of violence in schools.

„Prevention is more important than the actual intervention. Let’s stop hiding. We don’t have much violence, yet we all see that we are the champions of negative news, whenever something negative happens in the world or in Romania, these are the headlines that start the news bulletins,” the prime minister pointed out.