Drug abuse and drug addiction is a common yet destructive canker of the society that is making the roots of the society weaker and weaker day by day. Although the two terms are used interchangeably but both of them are quite different form each other and I have over viewed both of them in the previous article.
Although there are lots of possible detection methods of drug addiction including the saliva drug tests and hence the corresponding treatments but to understand it completely, I am going to discuss the epidemiology of the drug addiction.
The Epidemiology of Drug Addiction:
Addiction is generally referred to as the uncontrollable need for using the substances which shows obvious psychological signs upon tolerance or withdrawal. These substances usually include alcohol, marijuana, tobacco, cocaine, and some type of destructive drugs. Moreover, addiction is not only caused by the usage of substances but also by involving in some activities like sex, video games, and even internet.
The socially connected risk factors of drug addiction and drug abuse mainly involve the male gender usually among the ages of 18 to 44 years, the marital status of the unmarried individuals, the low socioeconomic status as well as the heritage of Native American persons.
Statistics and studies have shown that the people from western United States are more prone to substance abuse and addiction as compared to the other parts of the state. Males are much prone to alcohol addiction but the females may develop alcohol addiction by consuming fairly low amount of alcohol because of their low body mass as compared to the male bodies.
According to the researches, both American male and female taxpayers spends half a trillion dollars and above annually including the medical, economical, criminal and social implications. Another study shows that the alcohol abuse results in 100,000 American deaths and the tobacco abuse results in 440,000 deaths yearly.
People of every age suffers the damaging and disturbing effects of the alcohol and tobacco abuse. The babies have the damaging effects from the mother’s womb if she gets involved in drug abuse or addiction as a result of which complications in birth is encountered along with the slow intellectual development in the child in later years. The adolescents give poor school performance or eventually dropped out of school because of drug abuse. Adolescent female addicts have a risk of getting unwanted pregnancies, violence and sexually transmitted disease. Even adults also face the consequences of drug addiction.
