WVU Prevention Research Center is one of 25 academic instutitions to receive five years of funding for public health prevention research from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Researchers will use the grant to develop youth substance abuse prevention programs in two West Virginia counties based on an Icelandic model.
In the last 20 years, Iceland has cut their youth drinking and drug use rates radically by implementing free access to after school classes, music, dance and sports. For the past six years, WVU researchers have been working on studies to see if that model could be replicated in West Virginia to combat youth addiction.
Now, the CDC funding will allow the WVU Prevention Research Center to pilot two programs in Fayette and Wyoming Counties to implement ideas produced in the prior research. The researchers said the programs will still be based on the Icelandic Model but will be tweaked for Appalachia.
Appalachia Health News is a project of West Virginia Public Broadcasting, with support from Marshall Health and Charleston Area Medical Center.
