Impact of Drug Abuse on Family, Economy, Community, and Crime
The use of drugs can be either benefits the humanity or those same drugs can be detrimental towards mankind. It is evident that drugs are made for curing diseases and alleviate the condition of the human. However people can misuse the drugs by over countering leading to drug abuse. Apart from individual level, it has entered as a social issue by afflicting the family, economical structure and community level. It can be a major source of issue to family increasing the stress and straining the relationship. It becomes detrimental for the family members to live with someone who gets addicted to drug abuse. Apart from the family, it also influences the other segment that is the economy. Studies have revealed that $110 billion per year was held for the health related disruptive costs of social effects due to drug abuse (Beecham 2014). The drug abusers give poor quality in the work place due to incapable and absence of normal functioning. And in a broad prospect, community is also influenced due to drug abuse. There is increased number of diseases such as HIV/AIDS occurring due to drug use by injections. It has been reported from United States that, it alone accounts one third of the drug abuse cases (Seligman and Csikszentmihalyi 2014). Apart from affecting the community balance, drug abuse is also found to be associated with crime related issues and violence. Detrimental effects of drug abuse resulted in more than 30,000 homicides in Brazil (Bastos 2012.). Thus, where drugs are produced to advance the people welfare, it is becoming as one of the source of complication to social community if not controlled. Thus by implementing advocating policies it will help to provide preventive measures in controlling drug abuse. The advocating policies incorporate in generating information and spreading awareness in the community level about the risk factors on the health and community with increased fatalities.
A recent study has showed that approximately 24 million individuals are involved in eliciting drug abuse with 18 million people involved in alcohol abuse. It is evident that due to drug overdose 22, 114 people died 2012 (Degenhardt and Hall 2012). 10% population of US abuses drugs including alcohol with their families, co-workers, friends, neighbours and employers getting directly influenced (Day 2016).The expenditure associated with using drug and alcohol comprises to a total amount of $600 billion in relation to health care, revenue, several damages and legal fees (Rahtz 2012). Abusing drugs is interrelated to increased foster rates in child care placements, sexual assaults in colleges, abuse children, sentencing to prison along with productivity loss coupled with increased injuries in work place. Individuals addicted to drug abuse are more influenced to involve in behaviours comprising of risk taking, elevated prevalence of various mental disorders and mostly are incarcerated due to committed crimes in comparison to the individuals who does not use drugs. The burden is substantial associated with cost terms, trauma and influencing the youths of the nation (Caulkins Kasunic and Lee 2014).
Statistics Related to Drug Abuse in the United States
The persons who are directly related to the individuals, who are addicted to the drugs, face the hardest hit. The patterns that involves within the family are criticism at high level or spreading negativity within the households, inconsistency in parenting or in the situation where the parents try to cope up with the child addicted with drugs faces denial. The children lack basic necessities such as shelter and little heath care. 75% foster placements with 80% abuse in children are due to drug abuse (Leve et al. 2012).
Intake of alcohol and increased drug addiction causes a loss of $200 billion per year in the work place due to reduced productivity by the employers and co-workers (Kocakulah et al. 2016). The employers in the workplace indulged in drugs and alcohol can cause injuries resulting increased premium insurances. Productivity loss hampers the business that directly affects the employers in losing their job.
Addiction to drugs and alcohol is defined as chronic disease (Shield Parry and Rehm 2014.). The burden of health care due to several diseases surrounding the brain is more than $180 billion per year (Aufderheide et al. 2013). The mental disorders occurring frequently are due to prolonged use of drugs and hence increases the expenditure related to care. The costs are absorbed by medical authorities and are passed to the tax payer and employee by paying increased insurance premium. Thus drug abuse causes a huge financial burden implemented on the society and economical status. Apart from affecting the economy, drug abuse elevates the crime with 50% population in federal prison with 20% population in state prison (Degenhardt and Hall 2012.). On an average 5% homicides are due to drug abuse.
Drug abuse causes the parents to loss the custody of the child and affects the child behaviour too. Staying in a drug abused environment the children also gets affected by getting addicted to drugs and thereby increases domestic disputes (Herman 2015). The individuals affected by drugs get homelessness and faces poverty. With increased influence, the drugs increase the rates of mental disorders causing increased burden in financial care of health for the treatment of the disorders. The crimes in community are increasing with increased imprisonment. The business revenue is largely affected by the productivity loss occurring due to the drug addicted employers and workers. (Rono 2014).
An Advocacy Plan will focus on different measures that will help to prevent illicit drug abuse and its effects among people of all age groups. It will provide information on the possible risk factors associated with drug addiction, the effects of overdose on the health and the community and fatalities to the people who are most affected. It will also educate the parents, law enforcement authorities, educators and civil societies. The primary objectives of the action plan would be to advocate drug use reduction and harm reduction practices (US Department of Health and Human Services 2014). The Vienna NGO Committee on Narcotic Drugs defines advocacy as any form of activity or action that has the intention of influencing policy-makers. Such advocacy plans have the aim of establishing, developing or changing practices and building sustaining programmes. Advocacy in the field of drug addiction can be categorized in three ways: Peer or self advocacy (undertaken by peer groups or individuals who speak out for themselves), Professional advocacy (undertaken by helping professions who speak on the behalf of a person or the concerned issue, often removing the structural barriers) and Public policy (focuses on legislation and allocation of resources).
The Comprehensive Plan to Prevent Drug Abuse
The major tools to be utilized are Research and publications, activism strategies, awareness campaigns, education and training programs, Legal rights, government services, healthcare facilities and media (US Department of Health and Human Services 2014).
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Developing The Plan Of Advocacy |
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· Provide a range of services available for all groups of people. · Be flexible enough to allow for redesigning and improvements. · Include inputs form all stakeholders. · Support data informed decisions (Faludi 2013). · Develop performance outcomes. · Monitor and track progress. · Be sustainable. |
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Utilize Data To Inform Need Asessment Process |
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· Collect, review, analyze and distribute information about drug abuse in the state to support participation of the community in surveys. · Assess the prevalence and dependence problems by conducting surveys and evidence based approaches. |
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Possible Changes In Each Community |
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Educational Institutes- · Promote adoption effective curriculum to prevent adolescents from using illegal drugs. · Inform teachers and parents on the symptoms of drug abuse to monitor behavioral changes in the youth. · Design and distribute brochures to guardians about methods they can adopt to talk to their children about drugs. · Provide training to youth on ways to refuse peer pressure (Flynn, Falco and Hocini 2015). · Provide training to recruit peer support for avoiding drug abuse. · Establish life skills programs and enhance social responsibility (Botvin and Griffin 2015). · Establish incentives for youth who abstain from drugs. · Create employment opportunities for youth who have refrained from such activities. |
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Business Community- · Reduce the number of illegal drug stores in locality. · Train clerks and employees in refusal skills. · Increase penalties for merchants who deal in illegal drug sales (Demant and Marie 2016). · Publicize merchants to abide by with laws. · Establish a bureau for discussing talking on abuse issues. |
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Law Enforcement- · Provide information on police surveillance levels and law enforcement issues (Lancaster, Seear and Treloar 2015). · Mandate a quota to arrest of illegal drugs suppliers. · Implement a plan in collaboration with legal authorities to restrict all forms of access to vacant buildings, and other areas of illegal activity (Alimi 2015). · Create a helpline for reporting drug abuse incidents. |
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Media- · Broadcast community forums on ill effects of drug abuse. · Support telethons that feature all forms of prevention strategies. · Support prohibiting drug addiction billboards (Ferri et al. 2013). · Solicit radio, television, cable operators and print to provide broadcast time and print space for advertisements that portray the risks of drug abuse. |
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Health Organizations- · Establish rules for reporting cases of drug addicts in hospitals and healthcare centers. · Display billboards against drug abuse effects in pregnancy. · Educate medical students and nurses about substance abuse. · Provide affordable treatment services. · Create provisions for third party insurance coverage in drug addiction. · Train medical staff in intervention strategies. |
- Stringent laws, police drives, prosecution, and imprisonment of peddlers and addicts have proved useless and expensive earlier. The laws were harsh on unfortunate drug victims. Smugglers have managed to traffic drugs by illegal methods.
- Addicts generally resort to crime to get money for the drug after facing repression from the society.
- Drug abuse is related to organized crimes and endemic violence. Managing addiction would not be just sufficient.
- Advocacy policies have failed to reduce consumption of drugs, violent crime, importation and sales. They have failed to identify potential users and in providing treatment assistance to abusers.
- These plans also fail provide economic opportunities to addicts.
- These action plans marginalize and stigmatize drug users, thereby undermining their efforts in refraining from addiction and gaining employment status. .
Given these arguments, it is recognized that to effectively adapt the advocacy policy against drug abuse, existing institutional practices need to be reformed. These practices may have shown positive results in the past. However, there are a number of limitations that a policy encounters. The advocacy plan should be well suited for the advancing future. There is an urgent need to formulate changes accordingly and chart a course that will not only address drug addiction scenarios in a state but will also work towards reduction of crime rates, violence, illegal drug smuggling bypassing the law and employment avenues for addicts. An advocacy program will be most effective when it illustrates the key elements like: identifying individual risk factors, community risk factors, shaping a community, family attitudes towards drugs, peer pressure, social norms, stigma and involving schools and parents. Length of treatment, intensity of the treatment facility and effective aftercare measures will prove most effective.
Therefore, I conclude from the above discussed report that drug abuse is a major concern in our developing country as it causes a negative impact on the family and society hampering the balance of life. There are array of factors that puts the addicts at a risk. Advocating a proper action plan can prevent drug addiction and reform the addicts. I realised that collaboration on multiple partnership between educational institutions, business organisations, law enforcement, health care facilities and media is needed to focus on the specific needs of different groups of drug addicts at the community level.
References
Alimi, D., 2015. ‘GOING GLOBAL’: POLICY ENTREPRENEURSHIP OF THE GLOBAL COMMISSION ON DRUG POLICY. Public Administration, 93(4), pp.874-889.
Aufderheide, T.P., Nolan, J.P., Jacobs, I.G., Belle, G., Bobrow, B.J., Marshall, J., Finn, J., Becker, L.B., Bottiger, B., Cameron, P. and Drajer, S., 2013. Global health and emergency care: a resuscitation research agenda—part 1. Academic Emergency Medicine, 20(12), pp.1289-1296.
Bastos, F.I., 2012. Structural violence in the context of drug policy and initiatives aiming to reduce drug-related harm in contemporary Brazil: a review. Substance use & misuse, 47(13-14), pp.1603-1610.
Beecham, J., 2014. Annual research review: Child and adolescent mental health interventions: A review of progress in economic studies across different disorders. Journal of Child Psychology and Psychiatry, 55(6), pp.714-732.
Botvin, G.J. and Griffin, K.W., 2015. Life Skills Training: A competence enhancement approach to tobacco, alcohol, and drug abuse prevention. Handbook of adolescent drug use prevention: Research, intervention strategies, and practice, pp.177-196.
Caulkins, J.P., Kasunic, A. and Lee, M.A., 2014. Societal burden of substance abuse. International Public Health Journal, 6(3), p.269.
Day, E., 2016. BUILDING BRIDGES TO POSITIVE SOCIAL IDENTITIES. Addiction, Behavioral Change and Social Identity: The Path to Resilience and Recovery, p.172.
Degenhardt, L. and Hall, W., 2012. Extent of illicit drug use and dependence, and their contribution to the global burden of disease. The Lancet, 379(9810), pp.55-70.
Degenhardt, L. and Hall, W., 2012. Extent of illicit drug use and dependence, and their contribution to the global burden of disease. The Lancet, 379(9810), pp.55-70.
Demant, J.J. and Marie, S.L., 2016. What did they do?: A qualitative review of the content of alcohol and drug prevention programmes targeting adolescents.
Faludi, A., 2013. A reader in planning theory (Vol. 5). Elsevier.
Ferri, M., Allara, E., Bo, A., Gasparrini, A. and Faggiano, F., 2013. Media campaigns for the prevention of illicit drug use in young people. status and date: New, published in, (6).
Flynn, A.B., Falco, M. and Hocini, S., 2015. Independent Evaluation of Middle School–Based Drug Prevention Curricula: A Systematic Review. JAMA pediatrics, 169(11), pp.1046-1052.
Herman, J.L., 2015. Trauma and recovery: The aftermath of violence–from domestic abuse to political terror. Hachette UK.
Kocakulah, M.C., Kelley, A.G., Mitchell, K.M. and Ruggieri, M.P., 2016. Absenteeism problems and costs: causes, effects and cures. The International Business & Economics Research Journal (Online), 15(3), p.89.
Lancaster, K., Seear, K. and Treloar, C., 2015. Laws prohibiting peer distribution of injecting equipment in Australia: A critical analysis of their effects. International Journal of Drug Policy, 26(12), pp.1198-1206.
Leve, L.D., Harold, G.T., Chamberlain, P., Landsverk, J.A., Fisher, P.A. and Vostanis, P., 2012. Practitioner review: children in foster care–vulnerabilities and evidence?based interventions that promote resilience processes. Journal of Child Psychology and Psychiatry, 53(12), pp.1197-1211.
Rahtz, H., 2012. Drugs, Crime and Violence: From Trafficking to Treatment. Hamilton Books.
Rono, A., 2014. Effects of drug and substance abuse on employees’ performance in Eldoret Municipal Council, Kenya (Doctoral dissertation, Moi University).
Seligman, M.E. and Csikszentmihalyi, M., 2014. Positive psychology: An introduction. In Flow and the foundations of positive psychology (pp. 279-298). Springer Netherlands.
Shield, K.D., Parry, C. and Rehm, J., 2014. Chronic diseases and conditions related to alcohol use. Alcohol Research: Current Reviews, 35(2), p.155.
US Department of Health and Human Services, 2014. National action plan for adverse drug event prevention. Washington (DC): Author, 56.
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