Ad Week reported Aug. 25 that the GAO report on the ONDCP media campaign (PDF), requested by Sen Richard Shelby (R-Ala.), says Congress should cut back on funding for the campaign until ONDCP provides "credible evidence" that the campaign works.

Congress is expected to consider the agency's $120-million FY2007 funding request for the program when lawmakers return from summer recess. The Senate has endorsed that request, but the House has earmarked just $100,000 for the program. The current budget is $99 million.

In response to the GAO report, drug czar John Walters questioned the accuracy of the Westat survey, used by the Congressional watchdog agency to draw its conclusions. "Establishing a causal relationship between exposure and outcomes is something major marketers rarely attempt because it is virtually impossible to do," Walters said in a letter. "This is one reason why the 'Truth' anti-tobacco advertising campaign, acclaimed as a successful initiative in view of the significant declines we've seen in teen smoking, did not claim to prove a causal relationship between campaign exposure and smoking outcomes, reporting instead that the campaign was associated with substantial declines in youth smoking."

Replied GAO research head Nancy Kingsbury: "It is a really tough social science question to answer and we understand that. What puzzles us is that when the [Westat] contract was first put in place, ONDCP got a lot of political capital out of the fact that they had an evaluation. But it's just that it did not come out the way they wanted."

An ONDCP spokesperson noted that teen drug use has declined 19 percent in recent years, and credited the media campaign. "I think that's the definition of successful advertising," said spokesperson Tom Riley, who added: "Teens are saturated with pro-drug messages from rap music, from movies and from other teens around them. The campaign is the only national source of anti-drug messages and it is vital to continue funding it."