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As the 20th anniversary of the death of basketball star Len Bias approaches, his mother continues to warn of the dangers of drug abuse.
Working with the White House Office of National Drug Control Policy, Lonise Bias on Thursday said on a conference call with reporters that she considers it her life's mission to prevent drug use by others and said her son's life was a catalyst toward getting teenagers to stop using drugs.
Bias, an All-America basketball player at Maryland and a first-round draft pick of the NBA's Boston Celtics, died of cocaine intoxication on June19, 1986, after ingesting the drug in a dorm on Maryland's campus. His death came two days after the draft.
"A mission was birthed out of his tragedy," Lonise Bias said Thursday. She called on parents to do all they can to keep their children "healthy and drug-free. We are the medication young people need."
Bias said many have come up to her in the last two decades and told her the day Len Bias died was the day they stopped using drugs. "I've had a number of people tell me in the last 20 years that Len's death impacted their lives," she said.
Scott M. Burns, the deputy director for state and local affairs of the White House's Office of National Drug Control Policy, said studies have found that the rate of teen drug use has declined by 19% over the last four years, although the overall number of youths using drugs continues to be higher than it was in the early 1990s.
That means parental involvement in children's lives is still a key toward getting youngsters on the right path, Bias said.
"Parents need to come out of denial. We're still losing too many young people," she said.
With Internet technology and entertainment options much more extensive than they were years ago, Bias said teens are often inundated with the wrong kinds of messages.
"Parents need to understand the pressures young people are under," she said. "Their worst fear is being rejected by their peers."
Bias said she "had no idea" that her son, who would be 42 now, was experimenting with drugs. "If he did have a problem, I would have worked with him."
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