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The Greater Accra Regional Office of the Narcotics Control Board (NACOB) is investigating the production and sale of cannabis (wee) laced biscuits in the Ashaiman municipality. According to officials, the biscuits, which were being produced locally, were also being offered for sale to unsuspecting members of the public, including school children. Officials have therefore, mounted a search for an unnamed vendor said to be distributing the product within the municipality. The Greater Accra Regional Director of NACOB, Ms Victoria Esinam Assah-Offei, disclosed this at a sensitisation programme on the dangers of drug abuse among young people for schoolchildren within the Kpone-Katamanso District. According to her, the sale of the biscuits was making illegal drug use among young people more pronounced. The sale of the marijuana-laced biscuits, she said, was derailing efforts of the board in ensuring that incidents of illegal drug use among the youth were reduced marginally. Marijuana does not reduce depression Ms Assah-Offei noted that the perception that marijuana (wee) was a depressant and improved retentive memory was false. Such falsehoods, she indicated, were retrogression gains being made on public education about the use of drugs. She challenged schoolchildren and younger people to reject the drugs and report people who offered it to them. Regional Minister The Greater Accra Regional Minister, Nii Laryea Afotey-Agbo, regretted that the drug trade had taken a centre stage within the West African sub-region. According to him, not only did illicit drug trade pose a security threat to the sub-region, but it also posed serious challenges to the health and future of the people. "The drug phenomenon creates insecurity in our society and the dangers associated with it are equally worrying," Nii Afotey-Agbo stressed. He also lamented that people across the sub-region were taking advantage of the ECOWAS protocols on the free movement of goods and people to engage in the drug trade. "The idea of the protocol is to facilitate the movement of persons in their quest for legitimate business for the benefit of their countries and not for illicit drug trade," the minister said. He was hopeful that the programme would be sustained to ensure that drug use among young people was reduced.