Horting against drug addiction. Eduard Yeromenko
Drug addiction is a big problem of society.
The issue of drug addiction has been facing society since ancient times. No one suspected that this disease would lead to great losses, and most importantly, to the loss of young, energetic, talented individuals in whose hands lies the future of our state and, above all, our children. Today, the issue of combating drug addiction is on a par with the issue of combating crime.
Of course, these are some of the most important social tragedies. After all, they are interconnected, since almost 45% of crimes are committed in a state of drug intoxication. Unfortunately, today society has not invented a cure for this terrible disease. The legislation of our state is still imperfect for combating drug addiction. Every year the number grows and currently reaches 16% (1 billion people, when the total population in the world is approximately 6 billion). As you can see, drug addiction is the “Achilles heel” not only of our state but also of the whole world.
Today, solving the problem of drug addiction means getting rid of almost half of the problems that face the state and society. This is a priority task of state authorities and citizens, both in Ukraine and in other countries.
In my work, I strive to investigate the root of the emergence and spread of drug addiction, as well as to consider the main causes and reveal the consequences to which the negligence of some individuals leads. Although in the future they cannot be called that, because, having chosen this path, they lose their dignity and humanity.
The emergence and spread of drug addiction as a disease
First of all, it is necessary to say what drug addiction is. Drug addiction is a painful mental state caused by the systematic use for non-medical purposes by swallowing, inhaling or injecting certain medicinal or other substances (natural or artificial), which is accompanied by habituation and an irresistible urge to constantly renew their intake in order to obtain specific experiences, various bio- and psychotropic effects, as well as to alleviate the mental or physical state in their absence. In this case, a change in the behavior and personality of the consumer is determined. All types of drug addiction are united by common causes of the appearance, development, course and consequence. The word “drug addiction” comes from the Greek “narke” - clouding of consciousness, numbness, numbness, paralysis and “narcosis” - death, mania, madness, insanity, passion. These words contain a brief explanation of the state into which the person who takes drugs falls, as well as the consequences of taking them.
Narcotics began to be used in the distant past. The first acquaintance with drugs occurred at the dawn of human development after people learned to use fire. When lighting a fire in a cave, primitive people inhaled carbon monoxide, which is formed during combustion. Intoxication also occurred from inhaling smoke during the combustion of various plants, including poppy, hemp, and tobacco. It must be assumed that at the very beginning, the unconscious use of narcotics was tribal in nature. Therefore, the most ancient methods of drug intoxication were based on inhaling smoke, vapors, and smoking. The earliest information about the use of drugs (opium) dates back to the 5th millennium BC. A description of the production and use of “poppy juice” has been preserved in Persia. At the end of the 3rd millennium BC, written sources from the Sumerian state (the territory of the southern part of modern Iran) mention the hypnotic effect of opium.
In the 2nd millennium BC, opium was also known to other peoples inhabiting the Eastern Mediterranean. A Minecraft statuette (2nd-3rd millennium BC) found during excavations on the island of Crete shows a poppy head in its hands.
In ancient Egypt, various narcotic drugs were widely used. During archaeological excavations in ancient burials, collections of narcotics in various medicinal forms were found, many of which are still unidentified. For example, a vessel with medicines was found near the mummy of Princess Nefru, a component of which was narcotics.
In ancient Egypt, opium poppy was widely used 3.5 thousand years ago, during the time of the Bubastid rulers of the 22nd dynasty, the German scientist Georg Ebers in 1873 discovered an ancient Greek papyrus called the “Ebers Papyrus”. This document, written in 1500 BC, collected almost 700 recipes, many of which were based on opium.
With the development of medicine, there was a need for effective painkillers. This need paved the way for opium in history. Studying the healing properties of plants, Hippocrates did not deny the need for the use of drugs in the treatment of patients, but on the contrary, considered them valuable medicines. He widely used opium in his practice as a painkiller and sleeping pill.
In ancient Rome, about 400 species of plants with narcotic properties were recognized for use. The Roman writer and statesman Marcus Porcius Cato (234-149 BC) and the Roman scientist and encyclopedist Marcus Torretius Varro (116-27 BC) mentioned poppy in their works, which was part of opium-saffron tincture, Sabur tincture, etc.
The troops of Alexander the Great (356-323 BC) brought opium, the technique of its production and the method of its use to the areas of its conquest - Asia Minor, Mesopotamia. Thus, opium spread from West to East. However, the cradle of opium is China and India or Egypt. The French scientist Antoine Porro, as well as the inhabitants of Ancient Egypt, were users of opium, since there was a village called Mekon, which means "poppy city".
Persia, having reached its power, was a trading center and consumer of opium as Egypt and other Mediterranean countries.
India was the first country to export spices and narcotics to other countries. By 2000 BC, caravan routes stretched from India through the Babylonian Empire to the Mediterranean and Black Seas. Trebizond was a center for drug sales, and Phoenician merchants were the most active distributors of opium in remote areas.
English doctors considered moderate doses of opium harmless and tried to maintain its use, arguing that the masses did not want opium to be banned. However, the advanced people of India realized what harm this drug was doing to the Indian people.
At the international opium conference in 1925, a resolution was presented demanding that the world trade in opium be limited to medical and scientific needs. On the eve of World War II, 12 thousand tons were produced in India opium per year. Opium addiction in India was common among both men and women - 20% of opium addicts who were admitted for treatment were women. Opium smoking was banned by law in India in 1946. It is assumed that poppy became known in China in the 6th or 7th century. AD. At this time, small opium pills in the shape of fish appeared on sale and were in great demand, which in turn led to the emergence of addiction. Initially, opium was sold as a medical product, and then as a narcotic. Already from the middle of the 17th century. opium smoking became quite widespread, and opium began to be used mainly for narcotic purposes. Since the drug trade turned out to be profitable, opium traders from the USA, Portugal and other countries followed the British to the Chinese market. Opium smoking gradually began to become serious. The government tried to combat the cultivation of opium poppy, but a large amount of smuggled opium was constantly imported into the country, mainly from Bengal. Local authorities turned a blind eye to the drug trade, receiving huge bribes from English merchants. The forced import of opium led to the mass spread of opium smoking in China and began to pose a threat to hundreds of thousands of Chinese, leading to the degeneration of the nation. The emperor issued a law according to which drug smugglers were punished by death. This later became the cause of the so-called Opium Wars.
In 1908, an agreement was signed between China and India, which obliged them to reduce opium imports by 90% within 3 years, provided that during the same period its production in China would be reduced by the same amount. And in 1911, an agreement was concluded between England and China on the final cessation of opium supplies to the Chinese market within a seven-year period. England undertook to reduce opium imports annually by 1/3. In 1912, the import of Persian and Turkish opium was banned. Some internal measures were taken, which were not crowned with success. And only by a resolution of the People's Government of the PRC in 1952, opium smoking was essentially banned.
In Afghanistan, where drug addiction has become widespread, since 1957, the cultivation of opium poppy, its consumption and trade have been banned.
In Thailand, since 1959, the government has closed about 900 opium dens, although there are still about 500,000 drug addicts in the country.
In colonial African countries, a significant percentage of the population still has a pernicious addiction to opium. In the first years after independence, Egypt had about 200,000 opium addicts.
Before the official ban on growing opium poppy, Iran and India were the world's largest producers of this drug. Before World War II, Iran produced up to 6,000 tons of opium per year. Nowadays, opium use in Iran is severely punished, up to the death penalty.
Opium use and production in Turkey was not inferior to India and China. Wherever the Turks appeared, drug addiction spread like an epidemic. Opium smoking and taking opium inside were widespread in Turkey. However, the intake was condemned by the majority, and these people were contemptuously called theriacides. And to this day, Turkey is one of the main producers of opium in the world. Opium is produced there secretly and it enters the illegal trade both abroad and on the domestic market.
In France, classic drug addicts often belonged to artistic and literary circles. Here it is appropriate to recall the addiction to the drug of Charles Baudelaire, Theophile Gautier and others. Opium was also used by sailors of the French navy, especially those based in the ports of the Mediterranean Sea, which at one time caused concern to the government and its adoption of special restrictive measures.
The passion for opium did not bypass Germany, Italy, Austria and other European countries. At the beginning of the 20th century. the cause of this disease began to be closely associated with the pathological characteristics of the personality and character of the addict. Over the past hundred years, with each decade, opium use in Europe has become more widespread.
The First World War was the impetus for the further spread of drug addiction in Europe. The drug epidemic covered almost all the countries that were at war.
The Second World War also led to an increase in drug consumption in almost all the countries that were at war. This was facilitated by the difficult conditions of wartime, constantly traumatic factors, a forced sharp increase in the use of drugs in medicine, and population migration. However, after the Second World War, there was no decline in drug addiction. The issuance of drugs was regulated.
The use of opiates became especially widespread in the USA. Drugs were brought to America by numerous emigrants from regions where the use of narcotic substances was traditional. Chinese coolies - laborers who moved to the USA in the middle of the 19th century, contributed to the rapid spread of opium smoking in America. By the beginning of the 20th century, drug addiction in the USA had become a serious social problem. Only in 1909. the import of opium was banned in the USA. In the same year, at the initiative of the USA, an international opium commission was convened. In December 1911. an international conference was held in The Hague, which developed measures to combat the spread of opium. However, drug addiction in America was gaining momentum and after the First World War reached an unprecedented scale. According to statistics, in 1912, opium use by Americans was 12 times greater than in any other country in the world. In our country, poppy was known since ancient Slavic times. In pre-revolutionary Russia, opium smoking was widespread in Central Asia, as well as in large cities. Pre-revolutionary newspapers reported that there was a salon in Moscow where lovers of opium smoking gathered. In Tsarist Russia, no drastic measures were taken against this vice. Only after the revolution of 1917 did the fight against drug addiction begin. In a relatively short time, opium consumption was almost eliminated.
However, today heroin is the main product of the contraband drug trade. Its consumption is constantly growing. This can be seen in the example of the USA, which is the main consumer of heroin in the world. In 1969, about 180 thousand people in the country used this drug (only in New York about 100 thousand). in 1977 - 400 thousand, in 1987 - about 500 thousand. Currently, the turnover of the underground heroin trade is over 350 million dollars per year.
According to the Bureau of Drug Control at the US Department of State, 1-1.5 tons of heroin are imported into the country annually. More than 500 million people on our planet use opium and its derivatives - morphine, heroin, etc.
In our country, hemp was cultivated as early as the 2nd millennium BC, first in the Azov and Don regions, and later on the banks of the Dnieper and its tributaries. The passion for hashish is more common where hemp is grown. However, today in Ukraine, the number of people who smoke hashish has increased sharply among young people - approximately 8-10 times compared to 1990. (Police officers found about 3 kg of poppy in a 53-year-old resident of the village of Chervanivka, Bilopilskyi district. And almost the same amount was found in his 55-year-old fellow countryman. And an 18-year-old Buryn resident managed to harvest 2 kg of hemp over the summer. His peer from Sumy went even further - he prepared 1 kg of marijuana from hemp and sold it. He was detained by police officers with the money he received for the potion.)
In the garden of a pensioner from the village of In Shevchenkove, Glukhiv district, police officers discovered a record poppy plantation this year - more than 2,000 stalks. And a resident of Trostianets had 950 g of “new harvest” hemp drying on the roof. Reports have been drawn up on the facts. Drug owners will be held accountable.
In the village of Trebukhov, Brovary district, Kyiv region, a 22-year-old man was found to have hemp crops weighing a total of 28 kg on his plantation. An even larger plantation of “potion” - 56 kg - was found by police officers at a 71-year-old resident of the village of Yerkovtsi, Pereyaslav-Khmelnytsky district).
Cannabis-based drugs are one of the most widespread in the world: according to approximate data, there are 300 million people in the world who are slaves to this type of drug.
The development and spread of various types of drug addiction are associated with the attitude of society towards them, ethnic, religious, socio-cultural characteristics, the originality of emotional forms of behavior and lifestyle.
Causes of drug addiction as a disease
Success in the fight against drug addiction largely depends on scientifically based answers to the questions: what reasons prompt the use of narcotic substances, what contributes to this, who develops a desire to use drugs?
To defeat drug addiction, it is necessary to thoroughly study the causes and conditions that give rise to this evil. Knowing them, it is possible to develop effective measures of struggle, to put preventive barriers on the path of this terrible misfortune. Until the cause of drug addiction is clearly clarified, we will fight this terrible phenomenon of our life only with medical and legal measures. The causes of drug addiction, the ways and mechanisms of their spread are complex and diverse.
The number of factors influencing the development of drug addiction is constantly increasing, their qualitative characteristics are changing. Therefore, the causes of drug addiction cannot be reduced to any single factor. Sometimes one cause leads to drug addiction, and sometimes a number of causes acting on a person in one direction lead to its development. There may be a complex of causes, unfavorable conditions and favorable factors, each of which to a varying extent determines the development of different types of drug addiction.
The causes of drug addiction can be conditionally divided into social, socio-psychological, psychological. American doctors Jaskowitz and Osnoss from the New York Detoxification Center believe that the following reasons contribute to the formation of a drug addict:
a market that freely supplies drugs;
an environment that promotes or allows the use of drugs;
a certain individual inclination towards power;
The determining factors in the development and spread of drug addiction are social. One can trace a clear directly proportional relationship between the increase in the general spread of drug addiction in difficult periods in the history of the development of society, for example, during the war, when soldiers in extreme conditions saw drugs as a stimulant, they sought in them relief from the difficulties of the march and combat situation, they tried to relieve longing for home and loved ones.
Famine, various national troubles and social upheavals also contribute to the spread of drug addiction.
Weak people exist in any society, and many of them try to forget themselves and escape from real life. This is especially true for young people - often the disorganization of life, the lack of a clear perspective, the ambiguity of the political platform, the lack of ideas, the lack of purposefulness lead to confusion in the face of contradictory activities and can contribute to involvement in drugs. Not only this confusion, but also the fruitless rush to reality, the unsuccessful attempt to comprehend the true contradictions of both one's life and the life of society can be a fertile ground on which the family of drug addiction germinates. Although in most countries quite strict laws have been adopted regarding the control over the production and consumption of narcotic drugs, however, bypassing these laws, their production and trade are carried out on a large scale. Drug dealers, for the sake of their own enrichment, strive to constantly increase their clientele, attract more and more new victims to the drug swamp, who are recruited mainly from young people. This leads to a constant increase in drug addiction. The incredible profits of drug dealers from drug sales are one of the main reasons for their spread, because if there is a product, there will be a buyer.
In the modern world, there is an organized system of international smuggling of various drugs - a giant empire of the drug mafia. Opium grown in the countries of the Near and Middle East is illegally transported to Western Europe and North America, where it is processed in illegal laboratories in France, Italy, and Switzerland.
The United States is the main market for drug sales. Drug addiction and the drug trade have left a heavy mark on almost all of America. In New York alone, the drug trade brings in profits of over 220 million dollars a year. Recently, drug addiction has become a real scourge of society in other countries as well. The octopus of the international drug mafia has covered many countries of the world. There is data that it has 500 billion dollars in circulation, and uses approximately the same amount for bribing officials and advertising activities. The issue of drug trafficking and its distribution is discussed in parliaments and in various international organizations.
The spread of drug addiction is also influenced by the expansion of the range of narcotic drugs, the emergence of many new potent synthetic drugs and substances that are used only for narcotic purposes (LSD, etc.). Unfortunately, so far the successes of science in creating means of destroying life significantly exceed its successes in the fight against death. The development of drug addiction is facilitated by large-scale migration of the population, the emergence of drugs that are not traditional for some regions, for example, hashish in Europe, opium in America.
One of the social reasons was the deliberate spread of drugs by the colonialists among the population of colonial and dependent countries for the physical and spiritual exhaustion of peoples with the aim of their national enslavement, enslavement and exploitation. In a historical perspective, this can be studied using the example of China, Indonesia and other countries.
Modern American writers and poets, such as Robert Krill, Allen Ginsberg, William Burroughs and others, describe drug addict heroes in their works, intriguing the details of their lives and feelings. Often these works of literature were created in the intervals between drug intoxication. Even some scientists, for example, professor of the prestigious Harvard University T. Leary, with his two publications on drugs, actually contributed to their expansion. English writer O. Huxley, with his book “The Gate of Perception”, only pushed the development of drug addiction in Europe. Finally, we must take into account the situation in which young people live, that rather large group of young men and women for whom drug use is a new trend of modern civilization. One of the social reasons was also the indulgence of the government of some countries, in particular the lack of proper control over the distribution of drugs, their easy availability. Drugs can be purchased at will even in schools, lyceums, and universities. Therefore, it is not surprising that, according to some American researchers, about 50% of schoolchildren in grades 8-10 smoke marijuana alone. Children bring cigarettes with the drug to school, to parties and treat each other with them.
The level of drug addiction is significantly influenced by the mechanisms of social control, which include society, the micro social environment. The implementation of this control leads to the spread of drug addiction.
An analysis of the listed reasons shows that they are in the realm of social problems. However, social reasons for the emergence of drug addiction are not the only ones.
Individuals from the criminal environment forcibly involve newcomers in the web of drug addiction in order to retain and then consolidate their belonging to their group in order to make those who have just become fond of drugs obedient tools of criminal plans.
Even when the use of a comforting poison is necessary, legal, to curb unbearable pain, the drug, which is accepted as the most effective painkiller, poisons the body, gives rise to drug addiction, especially if frequent doses are required.
For example, we can recall the famous French singer Edith Piaf, whose drug addiction appeared after a somatic illness. She described her tragedy in the book “My Life”. Her addiction to morphine was so great that the singer often made life-saving injections of the drug right on stage so as not to collapse in front of the public.
Another reason for the development of drug addiction is insufficiently thought-out, careless, negligent or even unscrupulous medical prescriptions, as a result of which the first acquaintance with narcotic drugs may occur.
The threat of drug addiction becomes real if a person does not understand the danger of using any drugs without a medical prescription.
In the development of drug addiction, a significant role is played by improper upbringing of a child, when weak willpower and a tendency to run away from difficulties are formed. Of particular concern is the increase in drug addiction among schoolchildren and students (6-8 times in the last 5 years).
Most often, adolescents who live in an unfavorable socio-economic situation begin to use drugs. These are, as a rule, children from families with socially disadvantaged parents (alcoholics), from single-parent families or families with disturbed intra-family emotional and personal ties.
The following socio-psychological reason can be attributed to the negative influence of microsocial groups and a negative leader.
Drug addicts not only set a negative example, but also attract newcomers to this addiction. They need them as like-minded people with whom they share their drug experiences, as clients to whom they sell drugs, and as “rabbits” who subsequently determine a single drug dose of a new batch of drugs. In narcology, this phenomenon is called “proselytism of drug addicts”. It is widespread - it is believed that one drug addict attracts up to 10 people to drug addiction.
Curiosity is of great importance during the first drug intake. Future drug addicts try to satisfy it, experience something unknown, get to know an “unusual feeling”, a new impression, a mysterious experience.
Some artists, whose activities require temporary tension, and sometimes a high rise, sometimes take various doping drugs when going on stage. This is done in order to “improve” their mental state, get rid of anxiety, fear of the public and have greater success.
Insufficient sanitary and educational work also contributes to the spread of drug addiction. Drug addiction is a disease of the young. 85% of drug addicts are people aged 16-35 and most (90%) of them did not even foresee what consequences await them. Ignorance and drug illiteracy determined their attitude to drugs. Many believed that they were not in danger, since they only smoked hashish, and drug addiction, according to their concept, is when they “inject”. Thus, in the field of not knowledge and ignorance, complete fearlessness in taking a narcotic substance grows.
Speaking about the first, it should be noted that drug addiction has become widespread in our country precisely during the years of crisis: economic, ideological and political. The connection between these phenomena is undeniable.
Recently, it has been discovered that the restless state of the human psyche also has a chemical nature. It has been discovered that chemical “factors of anxiety”. Thus, the connection between drug addiction and environmental changes, air and water pollution and the improper use of chemistry, which negatively affect the body in this direction, is manifested.
This indicates a significant complexity and diversity of the causes of the development and spread of drug addiction, which once again confirms the great danger that drug addiction carries from all sides in various manifestations.
1. Consequences of drug addiction
Many scientists have begun to understand the harm caused by drugs and speak out about controlling their use. And the more widely drugs became widespread, the faster came the understanding and awareness of the painful consequences of their use.
Modern scientists and practicing doctors have received a lot of evidence of the harmful effects of drugs. Scientific facts dictate the need to get rid of a benevolent attitude towards taking drugs.
Drugs have a narcotic and toxic effect. The narcotic effect is manifested in the fact that they make a person mentally and then physically dependent. The toxic effect is manifested in the poisonous properties of drugs. However, the course of drug addiction is not audible, and its traces are not noticeable at first.
Drug addiction is a serious illness of the psyche and the whole organism, which without treatment leads to the degradation of the personality, complete disability and premature death. However, unlike others, a person brings himself to this disease, becoming a hostage to his own stupidity and carelessness.
Firstly, numerous studies of the action of medicines show that healthy people react differently to the same doses than sick people. The effect of a medical preparation is calculated only on the body in a state of illness, because taking medicines by a sick person leads to his recovery, and by a healthy person - to poisoning the body and disruption of its functions.
Secondly, narcotic drugs cannot be taken infrequently and little by little, since this fundamentally contradicts their nature. The euphoric effect of many medicines often occurs only in case of exceeding the therapeutic dose or violation of the method of their administration. It is necessary to remember forever that the greatest danger lies precisely in the first intake of the drug, in the first syringe!
What sacrifices are made on the altar of drug addiction?
This is primarily one's own health, the health of children, the happiness of loved ones, harm to others and the entire society. By taking drugs, a person condemns himself to slow suicide. The end of drug addiction is always dramatic - it is a life catastrophe.
Narcotic substances destroy all organs, but first of all they have a detrimental effect on the central nervous system, which is their main target, which is why drugs are called neutrotypical poisons.
After using a drug, the human brain is literally soaked with it. The narcotic substance freely penetrates the brain and saturates its tissue. This causes neurotoxic phenomena: oxygen starvation and disruption of conductive regulation between the main centers of the nervous system occur.
Large doses of the drug cause loss of sensitivity, paralysis of nerve endings, as well as the death of irreplaceable, with the smallest mechanism, nerve cells of the brain. Drugs affect primarily the most complex higher division of the nervous system - the cerebral cortex.
Weakening of mental activity, its decline occur in drug addicts much faster than in alcoholics. In this case, first of all, the core of the addict's personality changes, the main human traits are violated, individual and personal characteristics, the diversity of mental life are leveled.
In those people who began to use drugs during the period of personality formation (in adolescence), within 2-5 years, stable pathological personality changes are formed, their behavior becomes psycho-like, often combined with antisocial and asocial actions. If a drug addict becomes at a later age, the deformation of the personality is less pronounced, but there is a significant decrease in memory not only for current actions, but also the stock of knowledge is depleted.
Drug use leads to a decrease in intelligence. The ability to higher associations and creativity is greatly reduced. The range of interests narrows sharply and is limited to the main goal - to get drugs.
The mood is too unstable - it fluctuates sharply from irritability to apathy, from depression and longing to a short state of kindness. Over time, emotions fade.
Drugs, entering the body, disorganize the perception of color, the shape of objects, sounds, the sense of time and space is lost. In some cases, the formation of chronic psychoses resembling schizophrenia, with delusions, hallucinations is possible.
In case of suppression of the function of the endocrine glands, the basal metabolism decreases, as a result of which the body temperature decreases, sympathoadrenal crises occur, which cause headache, palpitations, paleness of the face, chills, increased or decreased blood pressure. As a result of constant intoxication, diabetes mellitus and other endocrine diseases can develop, the growth and development of the muscular system slows down, and sexual function suffers. Men develop impotence, women experience menstrual disorders, miscarriages, and premature births.
A child born to a drug addict mother shows signs of drug addiction from the first hours of life. Her body requires the drugs it received with the mother's blood. Getting rid of the drug after birth, she reacts to this with convulsions, crying, or other manifestations characteristic of adult drug addicts in a state of abstinence. Often these children are born with physical deformities or physical abnormalities, they have a delay in mental development, up to pronounced dementia, in addition, such newborns are often not viable. According to statistics, the mortality rate of newborns whose parents were drug addicts is very high.
In drug addicts, especially those who inhale drug poisoning, the respiratory system is affected, their function is suppressed. In this case, both the upper respiratory tract and the lungs suffer.
Drug addicts often suffer from such specific and infectious diseases as viral hepatitis, staphylococcal endocarditis, syphilis, tetanus, pneumonia, inflammation of the veins (thrombophlebitis), pustular and other skin diseases.
Drug addicts often have diseases that are not typical for healthy people.
To determine the effects of drugs, a proper medical examination is not always necessary, sometimes the nature of the disease can be determined by appearance. First of all, physical exhaustion is striking. Drug addicts are thin, pale, exhausted, look much older than their age, sleepy, tired, lethargic, indifferent to everything. Their faces are distorted by early wrinkles, yellowish-gray in color, the skin is thin, gradually becomes dry, old, peels, often pigmented. Eczema often develops. The body is dehydrated, deprived of the necessary supply of vitamins and proteins.
As a result of nutritional disorders, the addict's hair, as a rule, turns gray and bald early, thin hair loses its shine, becomes brittle. Violations of the circulation are also reflected in the nails: the nail plates are thick, wrinkled, brittle, and exfoliate. Teeth are affected by caries. "Rotten" teeth and periodontal disease are a common phenomenon in the appearance of a young addict. After several years of taking drugs, young people have no more than a few teeth.
All this indicates that drug addiction is a very serious disease, which mostly leads to early disability and a sharp reduction in life expectancy. It can be said with confidence that each new injection, inhalation or ingestion of narcotic substances inevitably shortens life. Imperceptibly undermining and destroying the entire body, narcotic poisons shorten life by 4-5 times.
As a rule, a third of drug addicts die on the train 5 years after the start of drug use, usually the average life expectancy of a chronic drug addict does not exceed 30 years, because the body cannot withstand constant exhaustion. Mortality among drug addicts is very high.
At least 28 million people in the world take psychoactive substances, 1/3 of them inject toxic drugs.
In Ukraine, over the past 5 years, the prevalence of mortality from drug addiction has increased almost 2 times. In 1999. 91.5 thousand people were registered, of which about 70,000 were drug addicts, 21,432 used drugs occasionally. The real number of drug users is 10-12 times higher, in particular, in 1992 there were 35,582 registered drug users. In 2003, 908 people were registered in the Sumy region; in the Konotop district 0.9% of drug users (70 people per 100,000 population), in Ukraine 173.9 per 100,000 population (120,000 people). Thus, the number of officially registered drug users increased almost 3 times. And special studies show that the real number of drug users exceeded 500,000 people. Only among minors this figure increased 1.3 times.
So, the collapse that a drug addict comes to is inevitable. This collapse is the price for apostasy from a normal lifestyle, for the fact that he has violated the ethical and moral rules and norms developed by humanity in the process of development.
Drug addiction and AIDS
A person who has become addicted to drugs suffers from almost all the vital systems of the body. He loses his physical health and working capacity, his perception of the world is distorted, and his psyche is deformed. However, that's not all. Drug addicts are exposed to another terrible danger - AIDS infection.
Most drug addicts have problems with housing, work (its absence), and accordingly with money and the law. HIV infection becomes another problem for them.
It is no coincidence that by the Decree of the President of Ukraine of December 10, 1996. No. 1184/96, the state programs for the prevention of AIDS and drug addiction were united and the National Committee for the Prevention of Drug Addiction and AIDS was established. (Before this Decree, drug addiction prevention existed exclusively within the competence of the Ministry of Health, the Ministry of Education, and the Ministry of Internal Affairs of Ukraine; accordingly, preventive work was carried out by each ministry separately, which means it was not coordinated). The relevance of such an organization is obvious, since there is an undeniable tight connection between drug addiction and the AIDS epidemic. This connection has also been noted by some foreign scientists. Doctor Ron Bayer from New York believes that the consequences of the fight against AIDS will be insignificant until a blow is struck against drug addiction, only this can slow down the spread of AIDS.
Drug addiction, as already noted, existed at the dawn of human development.
AIDS began to be diagnosed only about 20 years ago.
Acquired immunodeficiency syndrome – AIDS – an infectious disease caused by the human immunodeficiency virus (HIV). It is characterized by a profound impairment of cellular immunity with subsequent secondary infections and malignancies. The immunodeficiency virus was discovered in 1983 in the Pasteur laboratory in France by researcher Luc Montagnier and his colleagues.
In 1981, only 5 cases of AIDS were detected on the West Coast of the USA, then only 7 years later, more than 108,000 patients were registered in 130 countries of the world, and up to 10 million virus carriers. However, the number of patients and virus carriers continues to increase.
In 1991, WHO reported that the 500,000 registered cases of AIDS had been crossed worldwide. In June 1993. WHO already notes 600,000 officially registered cases, but estimates the real number at 2.5 million, the number of virus carriers at 13-15 million people. According to data from the International AIDS Congress held in St. Petersburg in 1997, the explosion of AIDS and HIV infections in 66% of cases is due to injection drug use, a sharp increase in the number of which was noted in Europe and in 1996-1997.
According to the WHO seminar (1997), the HIV epidemic in Western Europe among drug users began in the mid-1980s. By 1993, up to 30% of drug users were infected, and in some countries (such as Spain, Italy) - up to 70%. The first 6 cases of AIDS in Ukraine were diagnosed in 1987. In the next 7 years, the growth of the disease was insignificant - 183 HIV-infected people were registered, 43 of whom were AIDS patients, that is, 20-50 new cases of HIV-infected people were detected every year.
In June 1982, the connection between the occurrence of AIDS and drug use was determined.
1985 turned out to be a turning point. Social and economic crises contributed to the spread of drugs, led to a sharp increase in HIV-infected people. Since then, drug users (especially heavy ones) have become the main group of infection transmission.
The penetration of HIV into the environment of drug addicts and substance abusers marked the beginning of a new stage in the development of the AIDS epidemic. In 1995, compared to 1994, the total number of HIV-infected people in Ukraine increased almost 4 times and by the end of 1995 reached 1023. After 2 months (at the beginning of March), the number of HIV-infected people doubled and amounted to about 2000, among whom 300 people were sick with AIDS. Almost 70% of all registered cases of HIV-infected people were drug addicts. The spread of AIDS in our country has taken on catastrophic proportions. Analysis of the number of HIV-infected people officially registered in Ukraine in recent years shows that almost 90% of new cases are among drug users. In 1998, 6,516 HIV-infected drug addicts were registered, and in the period from 1994 to 1998 and 1 month of 1999 - 19,676 people. As of January 1999, 25,214 HIV-infected people and 859 AIDS patients were registered in our country. It should be noted that these are only officially registered cases. The real number is probably higher, since it is quite difficult to establish HIV infection among drug addicts.
Analyzing, we can note the close connection between drug addiction and AIDS. As we can see, the increase in morbidity in this group is catastrophically fast. Such rates, the growth of AIDS and HIV infection in the world, in Europe and Ukraine indicate that drug addicts are not an easily susceptible contingent and a potential reservoir of this terrible infection. Therefore, drug addicts are called a risk group for AIDS.
Drug addicts become infected with AIDS when HIV, which is on the walls of an unsterile syringe or needle, enters the person’s bloodstream directly during the injection of another dose of the drug.
Often, drug addicts infected with HIV have problems with the law. They are involved in criminal activities, as they constantly need money to buy drugs. As a result, many of them spend a lot of time in prisons. The increase in the number of HIV carriers among prisoners due to injection drug addicts has recently brought many problems and complications to places of detention. Thus, injection drug addicts are the most dangerous risk group in terms of the spread of HIV infection.
Drug addicts are faced with a choice: reselling part of the drugs to other drug addicts, criminal actions - theft, fraud, scams and non-criminal means - prostitution. Therefore, in order to have money to buy drugs for themselves, and often for their “close friend”, drug addict girls, “unburdened” by ethnic principles and cleanliness, morally sinking, embark on the path of trafficking in their bodies. This often leads to HIV infection and transmission of the infection to others. Young women drug addicts make up more than 30% of the total number of all drug addicts. In addition, prostitution also exists among men.
Teenage boys who seek to get money to buy drugs become the object of attention of homosexual criminals. Not to mention the moral side of this issue, its psychological consequences, many of the criminals may turn out to be HIV infected.
Drug users can be not only victims of HIV, but also a source of infection for others.
The growth of drug addiction is also a growth in the incidence of AIDS.
First of all, I would like to say something about children born to drug addicts infected with the human immunodeficiency virus. As of January 1999, 764 children with AIDS were officially registered in Ukraine.
The money needed to buy drugs is not at all difficult to obtain through paid donation. We can give a sad example of the discovery of two HIV-infected donors in Krasnodar Territory in 1996. During blood transfusions, large blood banks are not always used. Often, blood and its components are used “off the shelf” without the mandatory three-month incubation period. Even tested donor blood can become a source of infection.
Lives are at stake, since drug addiction, despite its difficulty in treatment, is curable in a certain percentage of cases, while this cannot be said about AIDS.
Drug addiction and AIDS, compared to other diseases, are already today not only serious diseases for the individual, but also negative and socially dangerous factors for the entire society. Realizing the danger posed by this still untamed epidemic, the first experimental “harm reduction program” from medical drug use and AIDS prevention among drug addicts is being implemented in Odessa with technical and financial assistance from the UN. In Moscow, a Hospice for drug addicts with terminal AIDS complications was established in 1998.
There are still no vaccines and effective means of treating patients, the only “prescription” against it today remains a healthy lifestyle with ethnic principles and moral cleanliness and the elimination of drug addiction as a social phenomenon from our lives.
As you can see, AIDS develops on the basis of drug addiction, so drug addiction prevention is simultaneously AIDS prevention.
Drug addiction and crime
But the growth of drug addiction is not only the growth of AIDS, but also the growth of crimes committed under the influence of drugs, which is taking on threatening proportions. Just as in Ukraine in 1989, 632 serious crimes were committed while under the influence of drugs, in 1994 there were 7,638.
According to the head of the Konotop district's anti-illegal drug trafficking unit, over the past 10 months (2003) 78 criminal cases were opened: 28.3% of them were domestic crimes, 68% were serious crimes committed by drug addicts, and 43% were other crimes committed by drug addicts. The following facts were revealed for the sale of drugs: drug addiction, theft (theft) of drugs.
To get money, drug addicts will do anything - they get some amount of money by means of deception, forgery, fraud, begging, extortion, they look for odd jobs, take money from the family, sell personal belongings and household items. When there is nothing left to take out of the house, the addict commits a crime, at first not a serious one (petty thefts from former friends and acquaintances).
As drug addiction develops, offenses become more serious. Starting with petty theft, theft, fraud, extortion, forgery of documents, prescription forms, they embark on the path of more serious, and then serious crimes - theft, robbery, murder.
Drug addiction not only destroys health, leads to moral devastation and decay, but is the basis for many crimes.
Personality degradation in drug addicts occurs much faster (10-20 times) than in alcoholics, and is one of the direct reasons for their committing offenses.
Drug addiction is much more closely related to crime than alcoholism. This connection is very clearly traced in the life history of a drug addict.
The development of drug addiction and the crime associated with it are directly related. Pathological craving for drugs is a stimulant for selfish murders, which are pursued with the goal of acquiring drugs or money to purchase them. In this case, a significant part of the crime is committed under the influence of drugs.
Drug addicts are often used by criminal structures. Having fallen into the hands of experienced criminals, drug addicts become a tool in their hands. By promising and distributing drugs, blackmailing and threatening, they persuade or force drug addicts to participate in thefts, robberies, and murders. Attempted suicide in our country is not legally punishable, but only morally condemned. But slow suicide with the help of drugs could be punishable, since by the time a person brings himself to death, he will cause a lot of harm not only to his loved ones, those around him, but also to society. By the way, in some countries the law provides for bringing to justice for drug use.
Thus, a drug addict loses his human essence, and society loses its personality and shoulder the costs of maintaining a primitive individual, a disabled person, a dependent.
Methods of combating drug addiction
a) Medical measures
Humanity began to take large-scale measures to combat this evil with great delay. In fact, only in the 19th century did governments in some countries try to ban or restrict the use and import of drugs. But practically only at the beginning of the 20th century, when drug use became widespread, did governments of many countries begin to take serious measures to prevent and eliminate drug addiction.
For the first time, the 31st US President Herbert Hoover (1929-1933) created a federal drug service headed by a special commissioner.
Subsequently, almost every president participated in one way or another in solving this problem.
Similar services have appeared in other countries. In Great Britain, in 1968, an institute for the study of drug addiction was organized. A special department for narcotic drugs was established in the UN, which performs various functions, including providing assistance to countries in the fight against drug addiction. The problem of drug addiction is becoming relevant all over the world. Therefore, recently, international forums and conferences have been held every year to solve the problems of combating drugs and eliminating their illegal production and trade. In the USA, 10-11 billion dollars are spent annually (90% of which are private donations) on anti-drug education for young people. The issue of drug addiction is constantly in the field of attention of the WHO, which studies the experience of combating this problem in the world and makes certain decisions. Every year, the whole world determines the day of combating drug addiction in order to draw the attention of all segments of society to this important problem. In Russia, the Russian Fund for Combating Drug Addiction has been created, which has extensive international ties to strengthen unity in the fight against the enemy of the 21st century. This common disease of modernity has not bypassed us. Moreover, it concerns not only vulnerable segments of the population. According to Deputy Prime Minister Dmytro Tabachnyk, in 2003, the efforts of law enforcement agencies together with the Drug Control Cabinet under the Ministry of Health of Ukraine stopped the activities of 1,400 centers of illegal production and use of narcotic drugs, neutralized 132 underground drug laboratories, and eliminated 27 international channels of drug smuggling.
Meanwhile, today, the state of drug addiction of the population, which is at a consistently high level, is of serious concern.
And although we have generally developed a good legislative framework, said the Deputy Prime Minister, the country has not yet created appropriate mechanisms for the practical application of the norms of domestic application and international law regarding the fight against this evil. In his opinion, this is becoming a serious criminogenic and socio-political problem, and the lack of effective barriers to the illegal production and distribution of narcotic drugs and the smuggling of narcotic substances into the country poses a threat to national security. Therefore, the Vice Prime Minister emphasized the need to strengthen measures to combat the spread of drug addiction in Ukraine and to intensify the work, first of all, of the Ministry of Internal Affairs, the Security Service of Ukraine, the Ministry of Education and the Ministry of Health (Ministry of Health). First of all, they are needed to solve a number of problems.
The Cabinet of Ministers of Ukraine intends to allocate UAH 302 million from the state budget of Ukraine for the implementation of measures aimed at strengthening the fight against illicit trafficking in narcotic drugs and psychotropic substances in 2003-2010. This was stated (11.06.03) by Deputy Prime Minister of Ukraine Dmytro Tabachnyk during a meeting of the National Coordination Council for Combating Drug Addiction.
Dmytro Tabachnyk emphasized that the government plans to allocate UAH 58.6 million for these purposes (and in 2003 it was UAH 45 million).
According to the Deputy Prime Minister, these funds will be used, in particular, to improve the material base of the laboratory, create rehabilitation and diagnostic centers, as well as border checkpoints and technical units of the customs service, etc.
The meeting decided to instruct the Council of Ministers of the Autonomous Republic of Crimea, regional, Kyiv and Sevastopol city state administrations, and the Ministry of Internal Affairs of Ukraine to develop regional programs aimed at combating the legal circulation of drugs and the spread of drug addiction, especially among adolescents and young people, in areas and cities with high rates of drug addiction, and to ensure their implementation. In particular, on the instructions of the National Coordination Council of the Ministry of Health of Ukraine, the Ministry of Internal Affairs, the Security Service of Ukraine, and local authorities, comprehensive inspections of enterprises involved in the circulation of narcotic drugs and psychotropic substances were carried out in the second half of 2003. The Ministry of Internal Affairs was to prepare a draft government resolution on the creation of an interdepartmental laboratory on the basis of the State Scientific Research Expert and Forensic Center for research and maintenance of an electronic catalog of information on synthetic and semi-synthetic drugs and psychotropic substances. The State Committee of Ukraine for Family and Youth Affairs must provide social sphere centers for youth with educational activities through a network of specialized services for children, youth, and their parents on drug addiction prevention, promotion of a healthy lifestyle, and formation of practical skills to resist the harmful effects of drugs.
Drug addiction is a medical and social problem, therefore it requires an integrated approach both in clinical and social terms.
It is impossible to form a person’s consciousness in isolation without changing the consciousness of the environment. And this means that to combat drug addiction, as well as other social diseases, it is necessary to create a healthy social environment, political stability, and improve the general economic, spiritual, and ethical atmosphere in our country.
The fight against drug addiction in our country is conducted in two main directions: prevention and treatment (hospital and outpatient care).
The main direction of our medicine is disease prevention. It is necessary to fight drug addicts not only where they are, but also where they may appear.
Prevention is a complex system of comprehensive state and social, socio-economic and legal, methodological and sanitary psychological and pedagogical and psychological measures.
In essence, it is a set of measures aimed at ensuring a high level of people's health, their creative longevity, eliminating various causes of diseases, improving working conditions, living and recreational activities, and protecting the environment.
The entire complex of preventive measures is conventionally divided into three stages:
Primary prevention is mainly social prevention, mass and the most effective. It is primarily aimed at preserving and developing conditions that promote human health and preventing the influence of various adverse factors. The basis of this type of prevention is the establishment of a healthy lifestyle for each person and the entire society. A healthy lifestyle means the full inclusion of a person in various forms and methods of social activity in accordance with the optimal and harmonious development of all his sub-structures - physical, mental, social.
Purposeful work on the prevention of drug addiction, the fight for a healthy person should begin in early childhood. According to anonymous surveys, in some regions, 89-90% of schoolchildren in grades 5-11 have acquaintances and friends who use drugs, 35-36% are offered to try drugs, 42-43% have already tried them (almost every second one) and 20% would like to try what they are, at least once in their lives. Young children begin to form their own ideas about drugs and the consequences of their abuse. Preparing preventive measures for younger children is more effective than trying to change the relatively firmly rooted idea of drugs in older adolescents.
However, the main responsibility for raising a child usually lies with the parents. Proper upbringing consists in parents realizing the profound influence they have on children and their behavior. Parents are the first educators who shape the views, inclinations and personality of a child.
Statistically, most drug addicts were raised in dysfunctional families. It is difficult to imagine how parents who suffer from chronic alcoholism or drug addiction can raise children. Even if we tried to imagine that a child in such a family is given due attention (which is unlikely), it is still typical for children to copy the behavior of their parents, especially in the preschool period, when they are looking for a model of behavior appropriate to the situation. Such people can be helped by actively working together by medical workers, teachers of schools, secondary specialized educational institutions, and law enforcement officers. Parents should not take a passive position - they are obliged to constantly conduct educational work, conversations, discussions.
The enthusiasm of young people in any field of knowledge or art (poetry, literature, music, painting, etc.) is one of the effective ways of normal, unimpaired psychophysical development, which distances boys and girls from drugs.
Proper upbringing can muffle the tendency to use drugs. Therefore, when raising “difficult” children and adolescents, maximum attention and care are needed to prevent the possible development of drug addiction.
Secondary, or socio-medical, prevention is aimed at identifying the earliest changes in the body in order to implement immediate and comprehensive treatment, improve the micro-social environment and apply various educational measures. It is very important that anti-drug information covers all families. The real chances of treatment depend on the stage of the disease at which treatment is started. Since drug addicts cannot abruptly stop taking drugs, they try to gradually reduce the dose. However, nothing comes of this. It is necessary to give up drugs forever immediately - once and for all. The complexity of the treatment problem lies in the fact that it is very difficult for drug addicts to develop an attitude towards treatment.
It is necessary to know that a patient who voluntarily appeared for treatment is not held administratively or criminally liable. In this case, medical confidentiality is obtained. The disease is not reported for the function of both an assistant and a consultant. During the conversation, the doctor evokes in the patient memories and associations related to those moments in life that caused mental discomfort. In this case, there is a reassessment of values, awareness of the cause of the disease, a change in attitude towards it. Then the cause seems to lose relevance, ceases to exist. This is what the psychotherapeutic treatment of the patient is based on.
The treatment process is not simple, it is long, and unfortunately, the effects of treatment depend not only on the capabilities of medical science. The need for treatment must be realized by the patient, his desire to get rid of a serious illness must be strong.
The active desire of a drug addict to recover is one of the conditions for the effectiveness of treatment.
Where should a drug addict seek medical help? In our country, the healthcare system has a narcological service, the purpose of which is to provide specialized assistance to patients with alcoholism. drug addiction and toxicomania. The organizational and methodological center that unites all structural units of the narcological service. is a narcological dispensary. There are city and regional narcological dispensaries.
The office of the narcological dispensary is located in the administrative districts of the city. There are narcological points at some large industrial enterprises.
The organizer of narcological assistance to the population is a narcologist. He identifies patients with drug addiction, examines them, takes them on dispensary registration, provides outpatient treatment, and, if necessary, refers them to a narcological hospital.
The responsibilities of a narcologist also include organizing and conducting preventive work. He communicates with institutions and enterprises located in the service area.
In recent years, anonymous treatment rooms have been organized in the narcological service system. A patient who has applied to such a narcological room. does not report his passport data. Information about his treatment in this room does not report his passport data. Information about his treatment in this room does not reach other medical and administrative institutions, that is, the patient is not taken into dispensary registration. Anonymous treatment rooms are organized in all large cities.
The third, or medical, prevention is aimed at preventing the progression of the disease, its transition to a severe stage, preventing exacerbations and complications, as well as reducing the level of disability and mortality. At this stage of development of medicine on the globe there is no single radical method of treatment for drug addiction. There are many methods of treatment for drug addiction. These include both pharmacological and psychotherapeutic, as well as additional methods of treatment based on the so-called behavioral therapy. Treatment terms can also be different. Currently, narcology has developed certain principles and approaches to the treatment of drug addiction:
Voluntariness is one of the main factors in the effectiveness of treatment.
Individuality. It is determined by the fact that in each specific case the specific weight of drug and non-drug treatment methods is taken into account, due to the different ratio of biological and socio-psychological factors in the development of the disease.
Complexity. It is one of the main principles of treatment, combining different treatment methods, combining different treatment methods at all its stages.
With the help of inpatient treatment, it is possible to observe the main rule - abstinence from drugs from the first days of treatment. Inpatient treatment is carried out in narcological institutions and only in the absence of such - psychiatric ones. After discharge from the hospital, each patient must be under the dispensary supervision of a narcologist to conduct anti-relapse, supportive therapy and periodically undergo a course of psychotherapy, physiotherapy, general strengthening treatment, and hydrotherapy.
Only in a pleasant micro-social environment is it possible to restructure the patient's moral and ethical attitudes and his labor re-education.
b). Legal methods
Currently, the structure of illegal drug trafficking is being restructured, international criminal groups are merging with similar criminal structures in Ukraine. Underground laboratories for the production of new types of drugs are emerging. Such are the realities of today's transnational crime in Ukraine. Therefore, in accordance with transnational crime in Ukraine. Therefore, in accordance with transnational crime in Ukraine, law enforcement agencies have developed a set of measures aimed at preventing and counteracting the spread of drugs in the country, and efforts are primarily directed at eliminating organized groups of drug criminals.
Actively combating the drugging of society has become one of the strategic directions of the internal affairs bodies and is considered a significant factor in stabilizing the general criminal situation in the country.
Ukraine is currently viewed by the international drug business as a new sales market and a convenient territory for transit, drugs of foreign origin (heroin, cocaine, amphetamines and others) are massively entering the country. Information from Interpol member countries indicates a large number of cargoes transported by sea from Istanbul to Odessa or Sevastopol, which then reach Western European markets via land routes through Ukraine. Numerous drug trafficking also originates from the countries of Central and East Asia, transiting through the Russian Federation. It comes to us. Black potion from Poland, Romania and Moldova. Employees of the internal affairs bodies have eliminated 52 international channels for the smuggling of drugs, the supply routes of which are constantly changing.
They are led by clandestine criminal groups with international ties. Their roots are in the countries of Central and Central Asia, the African continent. In 2003 alone, almost 200 foreigners were involved in the organization of drug criminals. Therefore, one of the forms of countering the smuggling of drugs into Ukraine is the conduct of special operations to cover up the smuggling of drugs. Every year, on the borders with Belarus, Moldova and Russia, the Ministry of Internal Affairs, the State Customs Service, and the State Border Guard Service of Ukraine conduct joint interstate operations “Channel”.
As a result of operations conducted in 2003 on the Ukrainian-Russian border, the ZUO uncovered crimes related to illegal drug trafficking, including 72 facts of sale, 42 criminal groups were liquidated, and more than 50 kg of narcotic drugs, psychotropic substances and precursors, cold weapons and firearms were seized from illegal trafficking.
Unfortunately, drugs have already penetrated into places of mass leisure, student dormitories, nightclubs, bars, and casinos, where young people are most often among the regular visitors. There are cases when employees of these institutions sold dope. Therefore, more than 200 applications for the termination of the activities of entertainment establishments where facts of repeated use or distribution of drugs were revealed have been sent to regional and district state administrations. The problem of drug penetration into educational institutions is worrying, on the territory of which only during the recently conducted special operation “Genofond” about 35 kg of such drugs were seized, and 177 pupils and students were detained in a state of drug intoxication.
The President and the Government of Ukraine consider control over the circulation of narcotic drugs, psychotropic substances and precursors as one of the priority areas of national policy. To coordinate this work and the state, the National Coordination Council for Combating Drug Addiction under the Cabinet of Ministers of Ukraine has been established, which includes representatives of all central government bodies involved in combating the spread of drug addiction in Ukraine.
At the same time, the Ministry of Internal Affairs, together with other interested central executive bodies, developed a Program for the Implementation of State Policy in the Field of Combating Illicit Trafficking in Narcotic Drugs, Psychotropic Substances and Precursors for 2003-2010. The purpose of the program is to solve the problem at the state level. This includes the development and implementation of methods of anti-drug education and training of the population, treatment and rehabilitation of drug addicts, organization of training of personnel in the medical and law enforcement spheres, development of advanced methods of drug detection, technologies for cultivating narcotic plants and destroying their illegal crops, improvement of law enforcement activities and interaction with law enforcement agencies and special services of other countries.
In most regions of the country and Crimea, drafts of relevant programs have also been developed, some of which have already been approved or submitted for approval by regional councils and state administrations. Unfortunately, the main obstacle to the implementation of local programs is problems with financing from local budgets.
Ukrainian legislation provides for both criminal and administrative liability for crimes related to narcotic drugs, psychotropic substances, and precursors.
The Criminal Code of Ukraine provides for criminal liability for certain types of crimes committed while in a state of drug intoxication or in relation to narcotic drugs, psychotropic substances and precursors, namely: smuggling of narcotic drugs, psychotropic substances, their analogues or precursors; use of funds obtained from the illegal circulation of narcotic drugs, psychotropic substances, their analogues or precursors, illegal production, manufacture, acquisition, storage, transportation, shipment or sale of narcotic drugs, psychotropic substances or their analogues; theft, appropriation, extortion of narcotic drugs, psychotropic substances or their analogues or possession of them by fraud or abuse of official position; illegal production, manufacture, acquisition, storage, transportation of them without the purpose of sale; sowing or growing of hypnotic poppy or cannabis; illegal introduction into the body of narcotic drugs, psychotropic substances or their analogues; incitement to use narcotic substances; for maintaining and organizing places for illegal use; illegal issuance of a prescription for the right to purchase narcotic substances; violation of the established rules is provided for by Chapter XIII of the Criminal Code of Ukraine. The main penalties applied to persons who have committed the above-mentioned crimes are restriction of liberty for up to 3 years and imprisonment for 2-15 years.
The Administrative Code of Ukraine provides for administrative liability for the illegal production, acquisition, storage, transportation, shipment of narcotic drugs or psychotropic substances without the purpose of sale in small quantities. Administrative penalties such as: arrest for 15 days or imposition of a fine of 18 to 40 tax-free minimum incomes of citizens may be applied to persons who have perpetuated the above-mentioned offenses. A good basis for combating this evil is several international documents that Ukraine has ratified. Ukraine participates in international organizations on the fight against illicit drug trafficking and crime. Information exchange continues, and this allows influencing decision-making based on the interests of the state. The attention of relevant international organizations has been drawn to Ukraine, and close ties have been established with the United Nations International Drug Control Program (UNDCP), which is the main executive body on drug issues within the UN and coordinates activities in this area at the international and subregional levels. Evidence of due attention to Ukraine is the repeated visits of missions to Kyiv to study drug situations.
One of the priority areas of international cooperation is the conclusion of bilateral and multilateral agreements on legal assistance between Ukraine and other states. To date, more than 60 such agreements have been concluded, most of which provide for cooperation in combating crime and illicit drug trafficking. Targeted agreements and protocols in this area have been signed with all CIS countries, as well as the Ministries of Internal Affairs of Austria, Poland, Hungary, Germany, Romania, Slovakia and others.
A specific exchange of information and delegations has been established for their implementation, meetings of heads of services, conferences and seminars are held. Recently, Ukraine has begun implementing the first stage of the Ukraine, Belarus, Moldova, Against Drugs (BUMAD) project, which is financed by the EU and UN budgets.
Despite the measures taken, the problem of drug addiction and related crime remains one of the most acute today. It is impossible to overcome drug crime and drug addiction with repressive measures of law enforcement agencies alone. The word of the public, education, and broad explanatory work are needed.
With minimal funding for the healthcare sector, the narcological service is unable to cope with the treatment of drug addicts and their rehabilitation. Private clinics, taking advantage of this, advertise the treatment of drug addicts but are limited only to removing the “withdrawal”
of drug addicts. The treatment itself requires considerable funds, which the average static person in most cases cannot afford.
As the practice of the “helpline” of the Department for Combating Illicit Drug Trafficking of the Ministry of Internal Affairs of Ukraine shows, many people ask questions that fall within the competence of social services, health care institutions and others. This indicates the ignorance of the population due to the indifference of some state organizations to the problems of drug addiction. Therefore, it is necessary, first of all, to bring preventive and explanatory work to the proper level; without this, it is impossible to overcome evil, because the drug business is looking for a gap to fill with its criminal and criminal essence. Law enforcement agencies and family members of drug addicts alone are not enough. Along with state work, extensive public work is also needed. Active interest is needed.
Ukraine, which is an integral part of the world community, could not stay out of the global epidemic of drug addiction for a long time. The significance of this problem in the country is growing every year. Our state has already turned into a so-called drug-addicted country. The danger of this disease can be understood from this work.
But in order to win over this disease, humanity must first of all understand the danger of this scourge. After all, many, especially young people, have the wrong idea about drugs. People are mistaken in considering drug addiction as entertainment that takes them to the world of pleasant sensations. They do not even suspect what danger these "pleasures" conceal, what consequences harmless at first glance hobbies cause, what life tragedy they lead to.
In my opinion, drug addiction cannot be completely destroyed, because drug addicts in the country have been and will be. It is only possible to reduce the number of addicts. To solve this issue, it is necessary to look at the root of the problem itself, it is necessary to find out the cause and create conditions so that in the future it does not lead to undesirable results. I believe that neither treatment nor perfect legislation will completely solve the problem of drug addiction.
The issue of drug addiction must be given more attention in every family, school, educational institutions, and enterprises, and knowledge about the harm of drugs should be popularized among young people, primarily in the periodical press, on radio and television programs, and popular science literature.
Problems can be solved only when society treats them with due attention, making every effort to eradicate them, then drug addiction can be defeated. And it is then, in my opinion, that treatment will have a result and the current legislation will influence people. After all, it is known that once a person is addicted, no current regulations can prevent him from obtaining narcotic substances or psychotropic drugs.
Therefore, it is necessary to urgently and actively engage in the fight against drug addiction, both for state authorities and citizens of Ukraine, using the entire arsenal of available means for this. Diverting young people from the streets and involving them in a healthy lifestyle is one of the important goals that the Presidium of the National Federation of Combat Horting of Ukraine sets for the coaching staff in its work.
Combat horting is taking responsibility, and the federation's staff intervenes in the nationwide fight against drug addiction by methods of direct contact with young people in sports halls, directing them to a healthy and fulfilling future life.
Sincerely,
President of the World Horting Federation
Eduard Yeromenko
2014