National Prevention Week Begins

National Prevention Week, a week of awareness and observance for mental health and substance abuse issues, began on Sunday, May 18 and will continue until Saturday, May 24. The theme of this year’s National Prevention Week is “Our Lives. Our Health. Our Future.” 

National Prevention Week began in 2012 and is supported by the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA). It is held in the summer as a precursor to events that might prompt substance abuse, such as proms, graduation parties, weddings, sporting events, and outdoor activities (SAMHSA, 2014a). It is SAMHSA’s hope that National Prevention Week will allow schools to participate in garnering awareness for mental health and substance abuse concerns. 

For this year’s National Prevention Week, SAMHSA has released a series of Web sites in Spanish  in an attempt to further engage the Hispanic and Latino communities (SAMHSA, 2014b). Resources now available in Spanish include promotional materials, a promotional video in Spanish, instructions for participating in the “I Choose” Project, and Web badges. 

National Prevention week underscores some of SAMHSA’s Strategic Intiatives, which can be viewed by clicking here and here. 

For the National Prevention Week 2014 Participant Toolkit, click here. 

Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA). 2014b. SAMHSA launches first Spanish-language web pages for National Prevention Week. Retrieved from http://www.samhsa.gov/newsroom/advisories/1404293216.aspx