Page 64 To enhance its efficiency, the committee is attached to the Ministry of Public Health and works closely with other ministerial departments. It also receives support from private organizations to carry out research on the issue. The centre for economic research, studies and surveys (CRETES) was commissioned to carry out a survey on the drug situation in Cameroon in August 2002, in terms of trafficking, consumption, the relationship between drugs, crime, prostitution, HIV/AIDS and the environment.  Sub-regional strategies on combating drug trafficking in Central Africa To address the threat to public and individual health posed by drugs, the countries of the Economic Community of Central African States (ECCAS), of which Cameroon is a member, organized the very first seminar on the issue, from 3 to 8 December 1990 in Libreville, Gabon. The meeting demonstrated the commitment of governments to clamp down on the scourge that had taken over the community. At the end of the meeting, preventive, curative and punitive measures were taken to lead to the adoption of a draft sub-regional treaty, which would serve as a framework law to be enforced by each State. - Coordination bodies were set up as a drugs control strategy. For instance, there is a coordination unit alongside the technical committee for combating the illicit drug trade across borders. The first was set up within the General Secretariat of ECCAS, with the assistance of the United Nations Drug Control Programme (UNDCP), which provides logistics, equipment and office supplies. - The technical committee was set up following a joint decision by Heads of State and Government of Central Africa on 6 April 1991 in Libreville. This commitment is considered as a continuation of the then Organization of African Union (OAU) (now African Union) policy on drug and narcotics control, which led to the declaration and action plan on drug abuse and trafficking at the 32nd summit of Heads of State of OAU, held in Yaounde on 8 July 1996. Per the same statement, it was decided that a drugs control centre would be set up for Africa. The action plan covered the period 1997-2001.  Institutional interactions at the international level “Drug abuse is a threat to this and coming generations as the plagues which swept many parts of the world in earlier centuries". This observation, made in 1990 by Javier Perez de Cuellar, former Secretary General of the United Nations, demonstrated international awareness about the risks related to drug abuse. Given the porous nature of our borders and the channels between the legal and illicit economy, all national strategies to combat drug trafficking have little chance of