We criminalize drug addicts in this country. To Nora Volkow, director of the National Institute on Drug Abuse, that would be equivalent to putting someone with Parkinson’s in jail. Drug addiction is a disease that changes the chemistry of your brain, and makes you unable to kick the cravings. It all stems from dopamine, a powerful drug that controls pleasure and leads you to make decisions that aren’t truly benefitting your body.
Volkow walks us through the reasons that different drugs trigger addictions and why certain people are more prone to addiction than others. It’s not only about genetics- nurture plays a key role in making someone vulnerable to the disease.
She also launches into a discussion on the human’s propensity for food addictions, a relationship more complex than that of drugs. Is it possible to transfer a love of chocolate to a desire for lettuce and running? It’s more complicated than you think.
Discuss
Sean Henne on December 7, 2009, 9:58 PM
Addiction, violence, civil liberties,crack cocaine, poverty, 2010 Olympics, drugs, prostitution, heroin, homelessness; and their impact on Vancouver’s Black Eye, The Downtown Eastside.
More than 2 million syringes are handed out free every year. Clean mouthpieces for crack pipes are provided at taxpayers’ expense. Around 4,000 opiate addicts get prescription methadone. Thousands come to the injection site every year.
addiction is a state in which the body relies on a substance for normal functioning and develops physical dependence, as in drug addiction. When the drug or substance on which someone is dependent is suddenly removed, it will cause withdrawal, a characteristic set of signs and symptoms. Addiction is generally associated with increased drug tolerance common usage of the term addiction has spread to include psychological dependence. In this context, the term is used in drug addiction and substance abuse problems
Impelled by the horror show of the Downtown East Side, prodded by activists and convinced by reams of academic studies, the police and city government have agreed to provide hard drug users with their paraphernalia, a place to use it and even, for a few, the drugs themselves.
The Harsh Reality of Drug Addiction
Not for the faint-hearted, this video is graphic and shocking and shows the depths of depravity that the human soul can descend to.After 11 months of sobriety from cocaine, heroin, methamphetamine and other drugs this individuals mental state has sunk to an almost animal-like existence.
http://www.2010homelesschampions.ca/reality_of_drug_addiction.htm
2010 Homeless Champions supports The Servants of Hope Recovery House
a proven model of recovery recently acknowledged by Operation Phoenix and the Vancouver Province Newspaper
This website is dedicated to telling the stories of the unfortunate individuals living in the Downtown Eastside of Vancouver in the hope that awareness of this problem will spur people to get involved, to let all levels of government know that something has to be done to alleviate this misery rooted in addiction, homelessness and depravity. To point the way to recovery from addiction, which we believe is the root of most of this situation. With the 2010 Olympics coming to Vancouver it is our mandate to record the transition and the extreme changes that are even now occurring and will continue to unfold in the Downtown Eastside.
http://www.2010homelesschampions.caAdd a Comment
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