What that means is we create the demand that is driving these bloody statistics. And the solution would seem to lie, at least in part, in dealing with our market for illegal drugs, starting with effective education of youngsters to curb appetites before they are developed. If there's no demand, there's no supply, although there's no question that's a simplistic solution, more complex in its execution that it appears on the surface.

Meanwhile, our two governments are exchanging barbs and pointing fingers in what is clearly a problem that requires a joint solution. Our president says that their president isn't doing enough to curb the problem, while their president says ours isn't helping. American officials complain that Mexico is not extraditing enough drug lords across the border to face charges for distribution and other crimes.

News reports say that since Mexican President Vicente Fox took office, 36,000 drug traffickers have been arrested, while 2,000 police officers have been investigated for crimes related to the illicit drug trade. Of those, 811 were ultimately charged, including the former state police chief in Ciudad Juarez, who is suspected of murder.

When I was growing up, it appeared that the drug problem centered among America's youths and was mostly a little experimentation on the way to adulthood. These days, it's undeniably much more entrenched and dire than that. We have in our generation some who didn't outgrow the habit — in some quarters, middle-age drug users are now raising a new generation of children who have no reasonable expectation of a better life.

While we're focusing on terrorism and various threats to our country, we need to look at what's happening a lot closer to home than most of us like to admit. I don't know many people who can honestly say that no one in their extended family has not been impacted by illegal substance abuse. And some will never be able to completely put their lives back together.

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Deseret Morning News staff writer Lois M. Collins may be reached by e-mail at lois@desnews.com