A serious look at drug abuse

EDITORIAL

Published: 18/07/2011 at 02:06 AM
Newspaper section: News

There are alarming new facts in the 2011 report by the United Nations on the use, abuse and trafficking of illegal drugs worldwide. The United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC) has just issued its annual report, with food for thought, and some alarm. Use of illicit drugs, it says, is not receding. To put it another way, then, government efforts to reduce the supply and the demand for illegal drugs have failed, including in Thailand. The criminal traffickers continue to exploit drug abusers.

The UNODC study says that in the past year, at least 149 million people worldwide have used illicit substances at least once. There are 46 million Thais in the prime drug abuse years, 15 to 64 years old. The study says that of these, 138,000 Thais have been involved with ecstasy in the past year, and more than half a million have at least tried marijuana. In today's world, these are not hugely disturbing statistics. In their youth, after all, people often do dumb things, without posing direct threats to a civilised society.

But then the report focuses on other, serious trends, which require closer attention. More than 92,000 Thais have tried heroin or are addicted right now. And the most abused illicit drug is the amphetamine class, which was been tried or hooked some 650,000 Thais last year. There is no breakdown, but then there is also no safe or calming form of standard amphetamine, methamphetamine or crystal ''ice'' in this illegal drug family. Even worse, of the 106,408 Thais who sought drug-abuse help of all kinds last year, a full 82.4% sought aid for their methamphetamine habit _ almost 88,000 victims against just 3,200 who need help with heroin habits.

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drake
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Discussion 10 : 19/07/2011 at 01:38 AM10
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Drug isn't the problem.
Drug abuse is.
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kaweeka
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Discussion 9 : 18/07/2011 at 11:21 PM9
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Personally I don't understand the attempt at measuring the dangers or effects of drugs by the number of deaths or crimes it causes. One can make similar comparisons to anything on earth, from the food we eat, to the liquids we drink, to the machines we operate, to the air we breath, to the risks we take on our daily rituals.

Drunk driving causes far more accidents than any of the illigal drugs - combined - but then again, cholesterol and fat cause far more death than drunk driving. So, by those measurments one would have to argue that hamburgers are more dangerous than a bottle of Gray Goose which is more dangerous than a few hits of heroine? Silly, right?

People always have, and always will find a way to alter their reality, drugs is just one of many such methods - religion is another. Which one is worse? I would say religion, countless millions have died because of it.
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kaweeka
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Discussion 8 : 18/07/2011 at 10:07 PM8
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D6 - And how did you conclude that I am talking about a plot to enrich gangsters? I simply referred to illegal drugs facing the same political process that alcohol had during the prohibitiion. If the government is truly interested in curtailing drugs because of the harm the cause, then one has to wonder why alcohol and tobacco are not prohibited as well.

This has nothing to do with class wars, no idea how you got that from what I said. But if you think that very powerful people in enforcement and government are never involved in this business you are truly naive. I don't speak about Thailand in particular, but about just about any country with a sizable user base, and which country doesn't?
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fundeena
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Discussion 7 : 18/07/2011 at 09:25 PM7
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@disc.2:" Would you still make that statement if their were an equal number of heroin users as alcohol users in Thai Society. No!!"

Yes, I would still say marijuana is relatively harmless.Less addicting,less medically harmful. What don't you understand?
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englishbob
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Discussion 6 : 18/07/2011 at 08:34 PM6
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Disc5 Kaweeka... What?!

Your rambling conspiracy theories are getting more and more bizarre.
There is no secret plot to enrich wealthy gangsters. Why is everything a class war with you?
People take drugs because they enjoy the feelings. Governments ban drugs because of the harm they can do.
Getting high is a classless hobby - from cocaine in nightclubs to bags of glue in the slums. Poor people take and deal drugs to escape reality and to make money. And so do rich people.
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kaweeka
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Discussion 5 : 18/07/2011 at 06:45 PM5
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Another superficial article on drug abuse that fails to tackle the real issues of drug distribution and prevention in Thailand. While jails are filled with drug abusers, they are barely and large drug distributors in it. The few that get caught are paraded on TV as a symbol of enforcement, but we all know it is a farce, with most people getting caught being competitors to someone more powerful.

But the reality is that most of these drugs are just an industry of financial wealth to many, and hence the main reason why governments keep them "illegal", just like the good old days of prohibition in the United States, which saw the raise of gangsters to have ever increasing amounts of influence over politicians and enforcements authorities as everybody sought their "piece of the pie".
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observer 101
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Discussion 4 : 18/07/2011 at 04:01 PM4
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Not to defend heroin;

Alcohol kills at least five times as many people as all illicit drugs combined. (direct and consequential)

Alcohol withdrawal can kill an otherwise healthy person whereas heroin withdrawal should not.
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meowmeow
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Discussion 3 : 18/07/2011 at 11:12 AM3
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Societies need to do more to educate people about illegal drugs, for example in the schools and at home. Everything that is done may help.
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sunnyjim
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Discussion 2 : 18/07/2011 at 10:20 AM2
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Dis #1 - Only because the three you mentioned are, when compared with alcohol and tobacco, far less prevalent in society, so therefore deaths are less common from Heroin as a percentage of the overall population. Would you still make that statement if their were an equal number of heroin users as alcohol users in Thai Society. No!!
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fundeena
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Discussion 1 : 18/07/2011 at 07:49 AM1
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Compared to alcohol, tobacco, methamphetamine and heroin, marijuana is relatively harmless.
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A serious look at drug abuse | Bangkok Post: opinion