Part 1

Drug Addiction On The Rise Worldwide

ALL over the world drug abuse has “now reached pandemic proportions and continues to increase,” according to a United Nations report. Take heroin, for example—

□ In Britain the number of known heroin addicts increased by nearly one fifth from 1978 to 1979, and the proportion of woman addicts continues to increase. Seizures of heroin nearly doubled in a year.

□ In Mexico there are some 630,000 drug addicts, according to rehabilitation experts. “Seven percent of all drug users in Mexico depend on heroin, an alarming sign,” notes one authority.

□ In Burma, where heroin was often grown but rarely used at home in the past, things have changed. There are now an estimated 30,000 Burmese heroin addicts, and the government is concerned.

□ In the Federal Republic of Germany drug-overdose deaths have been increasing very rapidly during the last decade. In fact, the country now has a per capita drug death toll six times as high as the United States. “There has not been a day since March of 1974 when heroin has not been in ample supply in the city,” says a West Berlin antidrug official.

□ In the United States heroin addiction is rising rapidly after declining during the 1970’s (due to diminished supplies of heroin at the time). In New York city heroin prices are lower and drug-related deaths are higher than they were a few years ago. “The habit I was supporting at $200 a day four years ago cost me only $100 a day the second time around,” admits one addict who was “cured” of his addiction in 1977 but started up again in 1980. Drug-related deaths in New York city rose 77 percent from 1978 to 1979.

But heroin is only the tip of the addiction iceberg. Plastic surgeons in New York and Los Angeles are doing a brisk business, repairing the noses of people who develop dime-size holes between their nostrils from snorting cocaine. “The dangerous thing is that the deterioration of the area usually goes unnoticed until it’s too late,” warns one surgeon, adding, “the largest hole I’ve seen was an oval of about three-quarters of an inch in length.”

New drugs like PCP (called “angel dust”), much cheaper than cocaine, are tuning up all over the United States. PCP, a very unpredictable drug, can cause symptoms “indistinguishable from catatonic schizophrenia,” according to doctors. Los Angeles police report three cases of PCP users who have snapped handcuffs while on the drug. The effects of PCP do not seem to wear off completely for long periods of time, if at all, because the body stores PCP instead of excreting it.

Yet there is more, much more, to modern drug addiction than heroin, PCP, cocaine, or other “street drugs.” A new generation of outwardly respectable drug addicts is emerging in many developed countries.

Part 2

The New Drug Addicts​—Anybody You Know?

MARY (not her real name) became increasingly tense after her husband divorced her and her daughter dropped out of college. “I was so upset I began drinking martinis at lunch,” she confessed. “When I caught myself drinking during the morning coffee break as well, I went to see Jack, my doctor and friend, who prescribed Valium. He said it would help me control the stress.”

Mary did not become an alcoholic, but, instead, she became addicted to tranquilizers, “a fact neither Jack nor I realized,” she said. She passed out one afternoon after accidentally combining too many tranquilizers and sleeping pills. “In my drug-induced stupor I’d left food cooking on the stove,” she recalls, adding, “I was minutes away from a serious fire when my son came home.”

An unusual case? Not at all. The National Institute of Drug Abuse estimates that some two million women are addicted to prescription drugs in the United States alone. In the 12-month period ending in April 1977, there were an estimated 880 Valium-connected deaths in the U.S. In most of these cases the victims had combined Valium with alcohol or another drug.

Consider Darvon. This popular painkiller can also be a person killer. In the U.S., in 1978 alone, an estimated 1,200 persons died from misuse of this drug.

While women have the highest incidence of prescription-drug abuse, men are by no means immune. A growing number of American business executives are overusing pills as well, often in combination with alcohol.

In some cases doctors have prescribed tranquilizers to help hard-drinking businessmen to get off the bottle. But, as one doctor reports, “at least 95 percent of them fell back onto alcohol within a year. But that’s not the bad thing. Fully one-third were then hooked on Valium as well.”

There are a number of legitimate medical uses for tranquilizers such as Valium, for instance in treating muscle disorders and epilepsy. But why are so many people getting hooked on tranquilizers?

In some cases the drugs are being misprescribed for ordinary stress. Dr. Sidney Wolfe, director of the Public Citizens Research Group of Washington, D.C., puts it this way: “At the moment there are ten times more prescriptions written for minor tranquilizers than are justified.” Studies indicate that many doctors feel there is simply not enough time to deal with the root causes of anxiety during office visits, so they reach for the prescription pad instead.

Tranquilizer manufacturers have recently agreed to begin carrying a straightforward warning on their labels that the pills should not be used to combat “the stress of everyday life.” Patients will lie to doctors, borrow pills from friends, or visit several doctors to get the medication they crave. The ultimate responsibility to avoid drug abuse lies with the user.

Part 3

Do You Need Tranquilizers to Cope?

DO THEY REALLY HELP?

A British study by Oxford researchers found that people taking tranquilizers such as Valium were five times as likely to have a serious road accident as other people.

“Over-prescribing has become a tradition of the medical profession.”​—Health expert quoted in “World Health Magazine.”

TROUBLE SLEEPING?

Are pills the answer? “In most cases it is highly inappropriate to give pills. Many people who can’t sleep are suffering from depression and should be treated in other ways.”​—Dr. Harvey Moldofsky, Toronto Western Hospital.

“There is clearly a recognizable lack in medical school education and postmedical school education about the proper prescription of hypnotics [sleeping pills] and their use and treatment.”​—Dr. Charles Krauthammer, Alcohol, Drug Abuse, and Mental Health Administration, U.S.

“BUT THEY SAID IT WAS NONADDICTIVE!”

“There is good evidence of physical addiction with Valium . . . A lot of people don’t know that Valium, Darvon, and codeine are addictive, and these are the [drugs] now being far too widely prescribed.”​—Dr. Sidney Wolfe, Public Citizens Health Group.

‘Valium withdrawal is more intense than heroin withdrawal.’​—Testimony by a doctor before U.S. Senate.

WHO IS PRESCRIBING YOUR PILLS?

British researchers found that 35 percent of prescriptions for tranquilizers are not written by doctors, but by their staff, usually the receptionist! Only 17 percent of the doctors surveyed insisted on writing all prescriptions themselves.

Wouldn’t it be a good idea to go to a doctor who is interested in really helping you, not just giving you pills? Don’t pressure him for medication if he doesn’t think you need any.