Drug Addiction In Pakistan Youths

A study on drug addiction in Pakistani youths

Drug addiction is a state of periodic or constant intoxication produced by the repeated consumption of a drug. Its characteristics include Uncontrollable desire to continue taking the drugs, a tendency to increase the dose after interval of time, a psychological and physical dependence on drugs, effects of drugs on individual and society.

Drug addiction is an abnormal condition which arises due to frequent drug use. The disorder of addiction involves the progression of sensitive drug use to the development of drug-seeking behavior, the openness to decline and the decreased, slowed ability to respond to naturally rewarding stimuli.

Drug addiction is basically a chronic disease affecting the brain, heart and other parts of body. Youngster start taking drugs at their teen ages and the first step of addiction to drugs is smoking. Drugs affect different people in different ways. One person can take and abuse drugs, yet never become addicted, while another merely has one experience and is immediately hooked. It can be said that dugs addiction is just a state of mind. Drug addiction is often overshadowed by many of the country’s other human development problems, such as poverty, illiteracy, and lack of awareness and basic health care center. But the fact is that drug addiction is rapidly growing among the youth of Pakistan.

Drug addiction is a complex brain disease. It is characterized by compulsive, at time uncontrollable, drug craving, seeking and use that persist even in the face of extremely negative consequences. Drug seeking becomes compulsive, in large part as a result of the effect of prolonged drug use on brain functioning and also on behavior. For many people, drugs addiction becomes chronic, with relapses possible even after long period of abstinence.

I chose this topic because I think it is necessary for today’s society which is taken over by the curse of drugs, mostly High School and university students are involved in it. It the main reason, today youth is distracted from their ambitions, and due to it today Pakistan, even after 63 years of independence, is 3rd world country. One of the reasons is that some people who want to quit but due to the lack of health care centre, they are unable to quit. Some people also involve in illegal activities to take drugs because they are not financially strong. This study will help us analyze the effects of drug addiction and will help us find better alternatives.

Drug addiction is a state in which the body feel relax and comfortable. Drug addiction among youngsters is increasing day by day, which have a very negative effect on our society.

Review of Literature

This study help us to examine that individual who are addicted to drugs are viewed negatively overall in the society. This research indicate that negative attitude are clear among young generation and it gradually increase with the age, so that the literature review indicate that level and accuracy of knowledge about mental illness increase from childhood through adolescence, negative attitude in youth also raise with the passage of time. On the other hand, adolescence is often accompanied by peer pressure or by other recourses. According to the study, it is also found that current users Marijuana says that it is less dangerous than other drugs. The study show that drug addiction is found in males as well as females and this trend is gradually increasing especially in females, and it is also shown in the study that trend of drugs among adolescent is also increasing in urban and rural schools. Results show that age-stigma association is quite independent of sex and residence. It also shows one of a factor that who are addicted to drugs are due to their close friends or you can say due to bad company.

This study shows the reasons and causes by which teenagers are motivated toward drugs. It show that who use drugs on a regular or occasionally are strongly supportive by personal choice due to lack of concentration from their parents and for enjoyment with their friends to eliminate their boredom. The reasons which are not using drugs in this study include lack of interest and fear from drugs and also from their parents and opposite reaction of their elders. The main purpose of this study is to emphasize the significance of parents in this regard. This research show the fact that increasing majority of children reported using drugs because they enjoyed them or they were bored and they want themselves to remain busy in some other alternative activities. The use of illegal drugs in children and teenagers are gradually increasing day by day. Result of this study showed that the main reason by which youth is motivating toward drugs is due to the peer pressure and their friends which were involved in such illegal activities. The other aspect to conduct this research was to finds the reasons that why some children do not use drugs. The first reason was lack of interest in the effects of drugs. Other main reasons included fear of immediate effect of substance, fear of physical and psychological harm and fear of becoming addicted to drugs. The finding and conclusion of this study is to get the reasons behind drug related decision especially in children and teenagers. Both who use drugs and who do not give lot of explanation and reasons. Children who do not use drugs reported that they are not involved in drugs are due to lack of interest in this activity, worries about the cost of getting caught by police or their parents.

As we all know the health hazards of smoking. Everyone is familiar from this fact but this curse is rapidly increasing among youngster. The main objective of this study is to investigate the signs of tobacco use, smoking as well as snuffing, at the age when most of the young generation is diverted toward this curse. In this study, it is found that now a day, smoking is becoming very common in girls as well. Sweden has the highest frequency of smoking all over the world. It is found in the study that frequency of snuffing among teenagers has amplified since the early 1970s, whereas the graph of smoking has reduced slightly during last decade. The purpose of this research is to explore teenager’s thinking of tobacco use, their shared ideas and images, how these design are reflected in their report about their own and other people tobacco use and also the ways understandings of tobacco use are related to the teenager’s development of a gender identity. It is found in the study that smoking cigarette offered males as well as females a short break from their daily routine and strains of family life. According to teenagers, smoking will ultimately lead to the break-down of the whole body. They also explain that invisible process inside the body, when smoking, will gradually be visible on the outside of the body. This research shows that youngsters think that snuffing has a positive effect as they increase their sports performance. But the fact is something else. Smoking and snuffing is just a mind satisfaction activity, as it affects lung and heart. On the other hand, it also affect externally like u see that the color of lip and teethes and even the color of face of smokers are also changed after a period of time. Some people are attracted to danger, and want to face risk, which is one of the reasons for them to start smoking. In addition, it is examined in the study that tobacco use is basically based on human nature. Smoking is a part of teenage lifestyle, such as being together with friends for hangout, parties etc. It is concluded from the analysis that now a days, new generation is well aware from all illegal activities such as, smoking, snuffing, drinking etc.

This research paper shows the planned use of prescription drugs of intoxicating properties other than physician’s description of specific drugs for intoxicating means or for bona fide medical condition, which is dangerous for human health. Research shows the rapidly increasing rate of abuse of such drug among youth, especially teenager. Such type of abuse of drugs is one of the biggest and main sources of drug addiction. In 2003, approximately 15 million US citizens were involved in using of prescription drugs for its intoxicating quality. For minimizing the rate of prescription drug misuse, government is making strategies to identify the early signs and effective clinical practices to prevent people from getting into it to avoid from massive problems in future.

The most abundantly used drug in UK is Alcohol and teenagers use it more than the limit described for health which 21 and 14 units per week for males and female respectively. Those who are new to alcohol must use bellow the limit for the safe side. This study is about the relationship between excessive use of alcohol and its affect on human memory. It is identified from surveys among excessive use and low-dose user that those who use alcohol in excess amount face everyday memory errors than low-dose. Excessive use of alcohol has a direct relation on memory errors and neuropsychological deficits. Alcohol is very harmful for heart, liver and other sensitive parts of human body.

The finding of this study is that use of substance is highly common among homeless and street-involved young people. Study confirmed that variables measuring psychological dysfunction and homeless culture predicted alcohol addiction, while institutional disaffiliation and homeless culture predicted drug addiction. Findings affirm distinct patterns of division related to alcohol compared to drug addiction. As homeless, street-involved young people continue to use drugs and alcohol as a strategy to cope with the various detrimental experiences associated with living on the streets, the result is often further societal estrangement. This study also show that engaging in criminal behaviors has been identified as an indicator of disaffiliation, especially among homeless population. Seeking drug-using friends and involvement in social networks that reinforce drug-related choices, attitudes and behaviors increases youths’ assimilation into homelessness culture. The purpose of this study was to determine whether domains of social estrangement are associated with homeless youths’ alcohol and drug addiction. Results show that specific domains of social estrangement do predict addiction, while others prevent from this activity.

Purpose to conduct this study is to estimate the incidence rate of initiation into drug injection and to identify predictors of initiation into drug injection separately among street girls and boys. This research show that that injected drugs are rapidly increasing day by day in street youth of Northern America and Canada. This situation represents a significant public health issue as young injection drug users are known to be the population at highest risk for HIV and HCV infections. This is the first study to measure incidence rates of initiation into drug injection by gender among youth at risk. Observed incidence rates are similar for boys and girls, results found having no association between gender and having ever injected drugs. In a study of young Canadian offenders, more girls aged 16-19 injected than their male counterparts of the same age. In this study, it is noticeable that girls were more likely to report having started injection using heroin while more boys reported having used cocaine as their first drug of injection. Results show that recent heroin use and recent cocaine use respectively tripled and doubled the risk of initiation for both girls and boys.

Objective of this study is to observe social contexts and processes influencing evolution to drug injection among street youth. This study show that some combinations of street life and drug use trajectories seem to contribute to injection among street youth. This study clearly shows the pertinence of examining how drug use practices are influenced by the individuals’ relations with their social environments. This study is the first qualitative investigation of the social processes that lead street youth to adopt drug injection. One of main finding is that the manner in which drug injection inserts itself into a youth’s life trajectory varies depending on when youth come into contact with the street, as well as their relations with the street scene and drug use. In this respect, it should be pointed out how diverse the trajectories of street youth are. While it is not possible to state with certainty that a youth will never inject drugs, it appears that certain youth have trajectories that are more prone to injection drug use than others.

This study is conducted on street youth on adolescent and young adults who spend their most time living and working on the streets. This socially and economically disadvantaged population is marked by perilous living conditions, including poverty, homelessness, and drug use. In study of homeless youth, the odds of an earlier suicide attempt were nearly four times greater among youth with an active diagnosis of depression, and nearly two times greater among youth who reported symptoms of hopelessness. In addition, depression is associated with high-risk behaviors, such as injection drug use and unprotected sexual intercourse that predispose youth to human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) infection. HIV infection is itself a well recognized risk factor for mortality among street youth. We observed a very high frequency of depressive symptoms among street youth, with more than four in 10 street youth reporting CES-D score _22. The greatest number of depressive symptoms was observed among weekly heroin users, followed by weekly crystal methamphetamine users, then weekly cocaine/crack users, and finally, daily marijuana users.

The research paper was on the impact of maternal alcohol and illicit drug use on children’s behavior problem and the objective of this study is to use a large, national sampling of mothers and children to test for evidence of casual relationship between maternal alcohol, marijuana and cocaine use and its effects on children’s health problem. This study provides some evidence that maternal substance use may be linked causally to children’s behavior problems. Although TSLS results are challenging due to the poor performance of the identifying instruments, OLS models, family fixed-effects models, and mother-child fixed-effects models all suggest that maternal marijuana and cocaine use are associated with increases in 4-15-year-old children’s BPI scores. Maternal alcohol use, as measured by the number of days the mother used alcohol in the past month, appears to affect behavior problems. This result is sensitive, however, to the addition of maternal depression and smoking measures. Moreover, the magnitude of this effect is very small, and maternal indulge drinking had no constant impact on children’s behavior problem.

This study is about the depression and participation of youth in selling and use of illicit drugs. The argument starts with the theory that drug selling and drug use augment each other, both at the individual level and at the aggregate level. For example, someone who sells drugs has relatively cheap access to drugs. And, someone who uses drugs may sell to help finance his/her use. The conceptual framework postulates that a recession would have direct positive effects on the prevalence of youth drug selling but ambiguous direct effects on youth drug use. The conceptual framework also postulates that drug selling and drug use are inter-connected at the individual level and the cumulative level. Thus, any effect of a recession on one would likely affect the other in the same direction. The limited empirical evidence indicates that both drug selling and drug use among youth is higher when the economy is weaker. The current economic crisis will likely increase both youth drug selling and drug use relative to what they would have otherwise been.

As we all are familiar that humans are routinely exposed to a vast array of environmental neurotoxicants, including pesticides, endocrine disrupters, and heavy metals. The long term consequences of exposure have become a major human health concern as research has indicated strong associations between neurotoxicants and a variety of dopamine-related neurological disorders. This study was conducted to know the effects of environmental neurotoxicants on the dopaminergic system and the possible role in drug addiction. A large variety of studies have demonstrated that a vast assortment of environmental neurotoxicants have deleterious effects on the dopaminergic system, consequently enhancing or impairing DA neurotransmission and disrupting DA-associated behaviors including motor control, motivation and attention, and potentially, vulnerability to drug addiction. Pesticides and insecticides, such as dihedron, parquet, and rotenone, tend to decrease DA activity and can lead to diseases such as PD, which are characterized by dopaminergic neurodegeneration. Studies appear to express a link between environmental neurotoxicity exposure and drug addiction although much work needs to be done to further identify and characterize the underlying mechanism involved.

Bupropion is an effective medication in smoking cessation and has a good safety and side effect profile. The effects of bupropion on extracellular dopamine levels in the striatum were investigated using raclopride positron emission tomography (PET) imaging in rats administered saline, bupropion and in healthy human volunteers administered. A cognitive task was used to stimulate dopamine release in the human study. In rats, bupropion significantly decreased raclopride specific binding in the striatum, consistent with increases in extracellular dopamine concentrations. In man, no significant decreases in striatal raclopride specific binding were observed. Levels of dopamine transporter occupancy in the rat at bupropion were higher than predicted to occur in man at the dose used. Thus, these data indicate that, at the low levels of dopamine transporter occupancy achieved in man at clinical doses, bupropion does not increase extracellular dopamine levels. These findings have important implications for understanding the mechanism of action underlying bupropions’ therapeutic efficacy and for the development of novel treatments for addiction and depression.

For a long period of time, China implemented restraining drug policies to cope with drug-related problems but on the other hand, the situation of drug addiction has rapidly worsened since the early 1990s. For example, the number of registered illicit drug users in the country increased from approximately 70,000 in 1990 to 1.16 million by the end of 2005. This paper is projected to intricate on the general principles of China’s latest Drug Control Law from the point of view of scholars who are involved in the field of drug addiction research and treatment in China. This paper also discussed the challenges we are currently facing, based on the observations and practical experiences the authors have obtained in China. It is hoped that by addressing these issues, we will be able to implement the new Drug Control Law more successfully and ensure that we deal more effectively with drug addiction in China.

Methodology:

This drug addiction survey is based on questionnaire from age (12 to 19) years, which is derived from 2005 cycle of Ontario student drug use survey. This research is conducted through questionnaire as mentioned above and the items of questionnaire are (1) Would you be afraid to talk or interact someone who is addicted to drugs. (2) Would you make friend someone who is addicted to drugs? (3) Would you feel embarrassed or ashamed if your friend knew that someone in your family was addicted to drugs? In this research, Ordinary least square regression is used to oversee and examine the relationship between age, sex, urban city, individuals and peer groups. Quadratic and linear age terms are included in this model. In this methodology, age variables were centered in order to reduce the correlation between the linear and quadratic term and interaction term.

The data on which this study is based was collected under large study of pre-teenagers and schoolchildren’s attitude and behavior toward illegal drugs and their experience. This research had both quantitative and qualitative components Data is basically collected by the survey which depends on questionnaire. Data is also gathered by interviews of individual to understand the thoughts and perception about drugs in children. Basically, the sample of this study is school in Glasgow and Newcastle. The quantitative element consisted of a survey of 2382 between ten to twelve year old children in 47 schools of Glasgow.

To capture teenager’s concepts of tobacco use, a qualitative approach with focused group interview was conducted for this research. Group discussion is the most useful and helpful way of sampling. The sample on which the research is conducted with 43 ninth grade students having age between 14 to 15 years old at two schools in inner Stockholm. Interviews are based on eight themes those are; (1) health and tobacco use, (2) the age limit of tobacco purchase, (3) school and tobacco use, (4) media and tobacco use, (5) the aesthetics of tobacco use (6) the ”pointless” tobacco use, (7) presentation of self, peers and adults as tobacco-users, (8) presentation of self and peers who do not use tobacco. The majority of the 25 non-tobacco-users had tried smoking earlier, 12 boys and one girl had tried snuffing. Among the 18 tobacco users more girls than boys use tobacco on a daily basis.

This research is conducted with the help of scientific questions. In this study, group discussion and interview are also conducted to read the state of minds of drug user that how these drugs affect their health and brain. Scientific questions highlights the need for research into the effects of prescription drugs on the developing brain, using both vitro and vivo models. Sample of this research is teenagers of United States.

In this study, existing -groups design was adopted to compare existing groups of excessive alcohol users and low dose user. The sample on which this research is conducted is the students of colleges and universities of North-East of England and each participant was tested individually at their respective college and university. Forty-five participants were identified as ‘excessive alcohol users’ having 28 females, 17 males, mean age of the participants is 17 years. Sixty-three were identified as ‘low-dose/no-alcohol users having 41 females, 22 males and mean age is 16 years. Alcohol and other drug use were assessed using Recreational Drug Use Questionnaire. Prospective memory Questionnaire (PMQ) was administered first, followed by the drug-use questionnaire and the whole testing time per participant was approximately 25 minutes.

Sample selected to conduct this research is three U.S. cities are Los Angeles, CA; Austin, TX and St. Louis, MO. Participate in the study, had to be 18-24 years old, have spent at least 2 weeks away from home in the month before the interview, and provide written informed consent. The dependent variable for the current study reflected alcohol or drug addiction as measured by the Mini International Neuropsychiatry Interview. Addiction to alcohol and various substances was measured by participant responses to a series of yes/no questions that identified those meeting criteria for abuse or dependence. Analyses were performed using SPSS, version 16 with statistical significance. In this study, chi-square, t-test and regression model is also used as a methodology.

Data were collected using semi-annual interviewer-administered questionnaires. Variables from the following domains were considered in Cox regression models: socio-demographic characteristics, early and current substance abuse, marginalization, childhood traumatic sexual events and injection exposure. The sample on which this research is conducted is some specific areas of North America, Canada, Baltimore and Thailand. In this 95% confidence intervals were based on the Poisson distribution. Unvaried and multivariate Cox regression models with time-varying covariates were used to examine predictors of initiation into drug injection.

The sample for this study is 42 street youth who participated in in-depth interviews. A typology of experiences was built founded on youth’s street life and drug use trajectories. The transition to drug injection was examined through these experiences. This research is conducted by a qualitative study grounded in symbolic interactions, a theoretical perspective through which, to understand the evolution of human behaviors, subjects are considered as creative social actors in their world. The study sample was composed of 42 street youth aged 15-25 years. 16 participants were girls, and 26 were boys. At the time of the interview, 17 of them had never injected drugs. Of the remaining 25 who had injected drugs, 8 had tried injection without pursuing it further, 8 had stopped after having injected regularly, and 9 were actively injecting, 1 of whom had been doing so for less than a year. Semi-structured, in-depth interviews were conducted in this research plan.

This study was conducted between October 2005 and November 2007, data were collected from a cohort of street recruited youth aged 14-26 residing in Vancouver, Canada, for the At-Risk Youth Study. Active drug users were classified by predominant substance of use: daily marijuana use, weekly cocaine/crack use, weekly crystal methamphetamine use, or weekly heroin use. Adjusted mean number of depressive symptoms (measured by the Center for Epidemiological Studies Depression [CES-D] scale) was compared among the four groups using multiple linear regressions. Logistic regression was also used to assess adjusted odds of CES-D score _22.

In this research paper, the child mental health production function is represented empirically by Equation. BP Iijt = α0 + α1Ajt + α2Xit + α3Xjt + α4ui + α5uj + εijt. The other equation for maternal demand for substances like alochal is: Ajt = β0 + β1Pt + β2Yjt + β3uj + ωjt.

Bupropion administration was calculated as:

Occupancy ¼ SBRvehicle−SBRbupropion h I =SBRvehicle – 100

Ten healthy participants were recruited by public advertisement (80% male; 90% right handed; average age: 47±6.7 years; age range 37-58 years). Nine of the 10 subjects were nonsmokers; the single participant who smoked consumed ∼10 cigarettes/day. None of the participants were currently taking any prescribed medication. All participants gave their written, informed consent to be included in the study.