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WHERE DO WE GO FROM HERE Unhappily, the second half of the Twentieth Century proved to be a pivotal pointin America's war on drugs. New drugs, new high levels of users and addicts, newtrafficking channels - it's been an all-out assault that shows no signs of relief. In the late 1960s, an entirely new drug consciousness arose, particularly among young- Caucasian middle-class Americans. Recreational use of marijuana, LSD, mescaline and other drugs were linked with the desire for an alternative lifestyle and were glorified in magazines and movies. Films such as The Trip in 1967, I Love You, Alice B. Toklas in 1968 and Easy Rider in 1969 brought this new consciousness to the big screen. In 1969, psychiatrist Dr. Robert Dupont began a testing program to determine how many prisoners entering the Washington D.C. jail system tested positive for heroin. When 44% of the prisoners tested positive, Dr. Dupont was able establish the first methadone program for these heroin addicts. While methadone took these addicts out of the illegal trade of heroin, it kept them addicted to an opioid drug. In Vietnam, the heroin problem with GIs began to escalate. By mid-1971, U.S. Army medical officers estimated that that about 10 to 15 percent or 25,000 to 37,000 of lower-ranking enlisted men serving in Vietnam were heroin users. And when those GIs returned to America, many of them brought their heroin habits with them. A few years later, cocaine channels between Columbia and the U.S. became more sophisticated, transporting a higher volume to both coasts. Newsweek even ran an article glamorizing the use of cocaine at fancy cocktail parties. Before the end of the decade, the highly profitable cocaine trade began to spawn violent shootouts and murders in Miami and along the U.S.-Mexico border. In the mid-1980s, crack cocaine exploded into the public consciousness in New York City, soon to spread across the country. More than eight million Americans have tried this drug at least once, and currently, more than half a million are regular users. The problems with cocaine were underscored by the shocking death of Len Bias, the young basketball star, in 1986. New awareness of the risks to health came to light, particularly the risk of heart attack or cardiac arrest when using cocaine. Despite increasing drug enforcement budgets, the Drug Enforcement Agency and local and state forces were unable to stem the increasing tide of drug use. In the last few decades, a rash of new drugs aggravated the problems: methamphetamine easily produced in a lab in your kitchen, GHB and Ecstasy appeared. Purer heroin in smokeable form hit the street in the 1990s. The popular catch phrase among the drugs users was coined "chasing the dragon" referring to smoking heroin, broadened the drug's use by eliminating the less socially acceptable practice of injecting the drug with a needle. At the same time, prescription drugs became drugs of abuse, starting with Milltown (tranquilizers) in the 1960s, followed by Valium, Xanex, Oxycotin, Ritalin and a long list of other drugs. America fought back with new laws. The Anti Drug Abuse Act of 1986 set mandatory sentences for convictions for dealing marijuana, LSD, crack and other drugs. Just after the new millennium, more laws were passed to make some of the necessary ingredients for methamphetamine hard to get. But since the demand for the drug didn't decrease, the only thing that happened was that small "mom and pop" meth labs went out of business while trafficking of Mexican methamphetamine skyrocketed. Despite some improvements here and there, drug use statistics have hit new highs in recent years. Government surveys in 1996 estimated that 13 million Americans were current drug users (meaning they had used an illicit drug or abused a prescription drug in the prior 30 days). That was 6.4 percent of those aged 12 and older. Each year thereafter, this number crept up slightly until 2002 when it jumped to more than 19 million, constituting 8.3 of the population. In 2006, the number of current users was over 20 million. Even the internet got involved in the growth in drug use. In the last few years, it's become possible to order addictive pharmaceutical drugs such as Oxycotin, Valium, Adderall and Ritalin from internet pharmacies which remain unregulated and difficult to bring under control. As the drug scene penetrated our society more and more, it showed no respect for the Drug-Free Zones surrounding our schools. The Center for Addiction and Substance Abuse at Columbia University reported in 2007 that 11 million high school students and five million middle school students had seen illegal drug use on their school campuses. Most law enforcement personnel facing this grim scene will tell you that the problem will never be solved with enforcement alone. Drug use must be dealt with on many fronts, from effective drug rehabilitation for those who become addicted, to drug education for young people that communicates the real danger of drug use in a way they can understand and accept, to a revolution in the way drugs are treated on television, in movies, magazines, music and other media. Another essential component in the fight against drug abuse and addiction is the strong role families can play. Studies by the National Center for Addiction and Substance Abuse found that teenagers who ate dinner with the family five times a week were far less likely to drink or use marijuana than those who only ate with the family twice a week. In addition to spending more quality "family time together parents arm themselves with accurate and easy to understand information on the subject of drugs and sharing this information with their children will go along way to impacting the negative affects of drug abuse on our American way of life. Knowing the historical ramifications of drugs in our culture is the beginning of the learning process. The next step is to understand the Life Cycle and Mechanics of Addiction as covered in the next series of articles.
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