Abstract
The Drug Abuse Warning Network (DAWN) is a government-funded drug abuse data gathering system used extensively at the federal, state, and local levels in policy formulation and program evaluation, and as an indicator of changing trends in substance abuse. This paper (1) briefly describes the DAWN data, (2) examines reviews of the DAWN system, (3) assesses the strengths and limitations of the DAWN data, and (4) illustrates some possible further uses of these data for research and policy purposes.