Drug Addiction & Prevention Programs Essay

In order to be able to cope with drug addiction, to help other people, who are can not help themselves already, it is necessary to understand all the mechanisms of this addiction formation. Unfortunately often people treat this problem on the surface, being sure that the main reason why people start to abuse drugs is the lack of moral principles, and as soon as they decide to use their willpower, they will be able to stop doing it. All such assumptions are absolutely wrong, as drug addiction is first of all a sophisticated disease and correspondingly there is no such option as involving strong will only in order to overcome it. Drugs are ruining for the brains of people, thus even those patients, who would like to stop it, are not able to do it themselves, without support, instructions and control from the side of specialists. At the same time it is necessary to remember that drug addiction is the disease, which could be treated and there are possibilities to return people to normal lives.

The reasons why it should be done are related to individual abusers and their health and lives and to the society in general. Drug addiction of separate members of the society inevitably leads to poor consequences for the whole society, such as increase of crime rates, decrease of general health state level, low productivity, increased crime and health –related costs and so on. Such personal problems as domestic violence or children abuse should be seen as absolutely socially important.

Understanding the basic characteristics of drug addiction could be helpful for understanding the ways to solve this problem. Thus “Addiction is a chronic, often relapsing brain disease that causes compulsive drug seeking and use, despite harmful consequences to the addicted individual and to those around him or her.” (Bauman, Foshee, Ennett, Pemberton, Hicks, King,  Koch, 2001, p. 604). Again it is necessary to underline that although an individual takes his voluntary decision, when he starts to abuse drugs, with time his brains are damaged, and there is no possibility to apply his self-control and self-motivation to the maximum extent. To mitigate the destructive effects of drugs upon human organism, medical treatment should be applied along with behavioral therapies. These therapies could be successful under the condition that all social and psychiatric conditions of the concrete patient were considered. However, there is no guarantee that there will be no relapse, which is not the sigh of poor treatment, rather of the necessity to reconsider the initial approach and program.

The strongest strategy in treating the problems of drug addiction is without any doubts the prevention, because drug addiction is a preventable disease. “Results from NIDA-funded research have shown that prevention programs involving families, schools, communities, and the media are effective in reducing drug abuse.” (Battistich, Solomon, Watson,  Schaps, 1997, p.2). Education and prevention programs are the keys to minimizing of the risks of drug abuse for general public. Community-wide prevention programs were developed with the aim to overcome the past problems of single-strategy approaches and systems, which were intended to treat the problems of drug addicted individuals. Any prevention program has two major focuses – decrease of risk factors and increase of protective factors. This is the basis, which should be used for building any preventive strategy or program for concrete social group or concrete region. The detailed plan for each program is worked out correspondingly with consideration of all factors, such as location, general education level, life and work and studies conditions of a concrete community and should include a range of interventions with involvement of young people, families, schools, criminal justice structures and society resources as whole.

Using the example of Indiana, is it possible to overview briefly the examples of successful prevention programs. Indiana is one of the states of the US, situated in the Midwestern and Great Lakes regions in North America. It occupies the 38th place by area among 50 states of the country. Generally this is a territory with various cultures and Native Americans, who had lived there for thousands of years. “Indiana has a diverse economy with a gross state product of $298 billion in 2012. Indiana has several metropolitan areas with populations greater than 100,000 and a number of smaller industrial cities and towns.” (Bauman,  Foshee, Ennett, Pemberton,  Hicks, King,  Koch, 2001, p. 605).

One of the well-known rehabilitation centers in Indiana is The Salvation Army, which worked out the resident rehabilitation program for supporting individuals in overcoming the chemical dependency. The advantage of this program is the availability to people with lower incomes, with special needs, such as for example mentally ill patients, veterans or HIV/AID patients. All the services are free of charge, including food, treatment, clothing and so on.

The researches show that drug addiction among teens in Indiana is rapidly developing into a huge problem. In response to that Indiana residential treatment programs for teens were developed. One of the main strategies of these programs is keeping a child away from his drug abusing peers. One of the flaws of these programs is often the cost of the treatment, although most of the parents prefer to find the money for this, as they want their children to be safe and healthy.

One of the successful projects developed in Indiana was the Strategic Prevention Framework (SPF), which included the five steps process of prevention, which is helpful to local communities in creating and implementing of their concrete prevention plans. “The Substance Abuse Prevention and Mental Health Promotion Strategic Plan for 2012-2017 outlines goals and objectives for enhancing Indiana’s prevention infrastructure, discusses the guiding principles for Indiana prevention, and presents various prevention and promotion priorities.” (Battistich, Solomon, Watson,  Schaps, 1997, p. 5).

Overall, the problem of drug addiction is one of the most serious in the modern society irrespective of the country and community; there is a strong need in working out the programs and approaches for treating of drug addicted individuals of any age, at the same time not forgetting about the prevention means, which are able to minimize the risks of drug addiction development. The segregation of the programs on the basis of age, gender, race, family situation of the participants of these programs is one the key principles for their success.

 

References:

Battistich, V., Solomon, D., Watson, M., Schaps, E. (1997). Caring school communities. Educ Psychol 32(3):137-151

Bauman, K.E., Foshee, V.A., Ennett, S.T., Pemberton, M., Hicks, K.A., King, T.S., Koch, G.G. (2001). The influence of a family program on adolescent tobacco and alcohol. Am J Public Health 91(4):604-610

National Drug Intelligence Center (2011). The Economic Impact of Illicit Drug Use on American Society. Washington D.C.: United States Department of Justice.

Rehm, J., Mathers, C., Popova, S., Thavorncharoensap, M., Teerawattananon Y., Patra, J. (2009). Global burden of disease and injury and economic cost attributable to alcohol use and alcohol-use disorders. Lancet

The terms offer and acceptance. (2016, May 17). Retrieved from

[Accessed: March 29, 2024]

"The terms offer and acceptance." freeessays.club, 17 May 2016.

[Accessed: March 29, 2024]

freeessays.club (2016) The terms offer and acceptance [Online].
Available at:

[Accessed: March 29, 2024]

"The terms offer and acceptance." freeessays.club, 17 May 2016

[Accessed: March 29, 2024]

"The terms offer and acceptance." freeessays.club, 17 May 2016

[Accessed: March 29, 2024]

"The terms offer and acceptance." freeessays.club, 17 May 2016

[Accessed: March 29, 2024]

"The terms offer and acceptance." freeessays.club, 17 May 2016

[Accessed: March 29, 2024]
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