Drug abuse

Drugs are not always beneficial to their users. In the sense of treating the cause or symptoms of an illness, some drugs have no beneficial use at all. People who use these drugs take them without medical approval and for recreational, not medical, reasons. Often the consequences of recreational drug-taking are harmful both to the individuals who abuse drugs and to the people around them. In earlier years most of the people who abused drugs either had easy access to medicines or were impoverished people for whom drugs seemed to provide the only escape from a hopeless existence. In the 1950s more people of all classes and occupations began to use mood-changing drugs without medical supervision, and more kinds of mood-changing drugs became available through both legal and illegal channels. Some mood-changing drugs induce relaxation or sleep. Others induce feelings of exhilaration. All affect the nervous system and all can cause emotional change. Research suggests that addictive drugs and drugs that are commonly abused increase levels of dopamine—an organic compound that inhibits the transmission of nerve impulses—in the brain. The temporary sense of well-being that is produced by such drugs fades when the effects of the drug have worn off, and users are faced with the same problems that plagued them previously. They may then take another dose of the drug rather than endure the pain and trouble of dealing with the original problems. When this happens, the users are said to have acquired a psychological dependence on the drug. As a result, they may stop maturing. In severe cases, drug addicts direct all their energies to getting more of the drug to which they are addicted. In less severe cases—particularly dependence on such legal drugs as the nicotine in cigarettes and the caffeine in coffee—users simply make taking the drug part of their daily routines. In this case the inconvenience of dependence may be considered the personal problem of the users themselves.

The opium poppy contains a narcotic drug called opium—the raw material for some of the most powerful painkillers medicine can provide. Opium itself, opium derivatives (called opiates) such as morphine and codeine, and synthetic chemicals that resemble opium (called opioids) are prescribed for the relief of extreme pain, but opium can also be converted into the dangerous drug heroin. The effect of opium-related drugs depends to a certain extent on the user. Pain-free persons may simply feel dizzy and nauseated on first taking such a drug. For most susceptible people, however, a dose of an opium-related drug makes worries seem distant. This carefree feeling may be followed by a period of stupor. A severe depression commonly follows the stupor, and a regular abuser will want another dose of the drug to ward off this depression. If people take any opium-related drug often enough, they become physically dependent, or addicted, to the drug. If they stop taking it, they become very ill with a withdrawal syndrome. If they are treated with proper medication, the withdrawal syndrome is said to be like influenza, but without such help it can be agonizing. Many drug habits are maintained to avoid this syndrome. (See also Habit and Addiction.) Heroin addiction presents a special danger. Other opium-related drugs are obtained illegally from medical supplies. Heroin, however, is not used for medicinal purposes, and the criminals who produce it are not subject to any quality controls. The heroin they peddle is usually contaminated with all sorts of microorganisms. Moreover, purchasers never know just how much heroin they are buying. Heroin often kills when an addict buys an unusually pure sample and unintentionally injects an overdose. (See also Opium.) The most effective form of treatment for addiction to heroin and other narcotics is the synthetic narcotic drug methadone. The drug itself is extremely addictive, but when it is given to heroin addicts on a daily basis, it prevents withdrawal syndrome and suppresses the drug hunger for heroin. The addict is then gradually weaned from the methadone addiction. (See also Narcotic and Sedative.) (From: Britannica Student Encyclopedia 2004 Children's Edition. 1994-2003

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