You certainly wouldn’t be happy if one of your kids came home with an 18 percent on one of their tests. As parents, we should hold ourselves to the same standard. Unfortunately, according to the 2008 Partnership Attitude Tracking Study, only 18 percent of teens say their parents talk to them about cough medicine abuse.

If you are reading this, we know you likely fall into the 18 percent of parents who have already talked to their kids, but it is important that we continue to talk to other parents about this issue. The more parents who know about cough medicine abuse, the more we will able to improve this statistic and protect our teens. With that in mind, it’s time we take our mission to the next level and ensure that all of our communities earn an A+ when it comes to cough medicine abuse prevention.

There are a number of ways you can help spread the word in your community about cough medicine abuse. Stop Medicine Abuse has made sharing information easy through the Tell-a-Friend tool. You also can share individual Stop Medicine Abuse articles with your friends and family by e-mail, instant message, or through other web sites through the links at the top-right corner of every article. And now you can share this information with your friends on Facebook.

Reaching out to your friends online is a valuable way to teach others about cough medicine abuse and to prove that each of us can make a difference in our communities. If you have taken action in your community, let us know at the Stop Medicine Abuse fan page. Your work in spreading the word about cough medicine abuse has helped us reach tens of thousands of families, and together, we can reach many more.