Drug Abuse and Society

Drug addiction continues to be a major concern for society and the concern grows with every passing year. Not only do drug affect the addict and his or her loved ones, but also society at large with rippling effects. The book, Righteous Dopfiend written by Bourgois Schonberg explains the effects of drug addiction on individuals, families, neighborhoods, and the larger society. Drug addictions debilitating effects range from financial, to functional, to emotional and should by no means be taken lightly. Drug is a disease; the negative consequences of drug abuse affect not only individuals who abuse drugs but also their families and friends, various businesses and government resources.

Drug addiction is a progressive and insidious disease that creeps up on individuals and unfortunately most don’t recognize the problem until addiction has completely taken over. The signs are so subtle and easily overlooked that millions of people today are struggling with addictions and don’t even realize the fact that they are on a dangerously slippery slope. Addicts are not only those who use cocaine everyday, but also those vacillate between cocaine, pills, ecstasy, tranquilizer, marijuana, alcohol, and any other drug. Addiction is a very clever brain disease that will try to convince to addict that they need drugs to function, despite negative consequence. Drug addiction is a disease that turns the human brain into a dangerous killer, constantly giving excuses and justification for drug abuse. For this reason, drug addiction is one of the most devastating diseases plaguing our society. Drug addicts can’t see it until they’ve lost control, and even then, addiction continues to drive the destructive behavior associated with the disease, and the  

character Tina of Righteous Dopefined is a perfect example of it, she went through all the things mentioned above.

              Drug addiction is also one of the fastest ways to spread the HIV virus, through the sharing of needles and other drug paraphernalia. It is also spread through just using drugs, because of the effect of drugs on a person’s judgment. This can cause people to make bad decisions and participate in dangerous sexual activities with an infected individual. The drug addiction has many impacts on the society, and one of them is Economy. According to NIDA, drug addiction has an economic impact on society of $67 billion per year. This includes costs related to crimes and incarceration, drug addiction, treatment medical costs from overdoses and drug related injuries and complications, time lost from work and social welfare programs. Because drug addiction is disease of a brain, which is the center of judgment and behavioral patterns, drug addicts have a disturbingly high propensity to commit unlawful and immoral acts to obtain these substances.

           Moreover, once under the influence of drugs, the addict’s inhibitions are drastically lowered with a sense of indestructibility, which leads to aggressive and irresponsible behavior. According to the National highway traffic safety administration there were 17,941 alcohol related traffic fatalities in 2006 a 2.4% increase from 2005 NIDA also states that getting treatment can reduce these costs as addiction treatment, centers and programs help addicts to learn to live a sober life ,freeing them from the behavioral problems associated with drug addiction.There are many informative websites like American council for drug education. “www.acde.org” which educate the public on addictions and help addicts to get rid of addictions.