'Drugs affect not only users but also families'

Thomas More Adhika Prabhaswara, Member of ASEAN Law Students' Association, Sanur, Bali

Illegal drugs have been around for thousands of years but only in recent times have they become a worldwide scourge that is irreverent of place, age or status.

Every year thousands of individuals are lost to drugs. The majority of people who are affected by drugs are youths.

There is no greater asset to any country than its young generation. They hold the future in their hands and the decisions they make today will shape the entire region.

Drugs affect not only the users, but also their families, schools and communities will also feel the devastation of drugs. For this reason, they must be prepared to face drugs and understand their potential damage.

Drugs are generally availabile but nonetheless restricted. Any one of a number of drugs or other substances, which are strictly regulated or outlawed because of their potential for abuse or addiction can be found. These include those classified as narcotics, stimulants, depressants, hallucinogens and cannabis.

In illegal trade, controlled substances are known as "drugs" or "dope." Commonly known substances can be classified as follows:

Cannabis: This class includes marijuana, hashish and hashish oil. Normally smoked, this drug is essentially an intoxicant and has no psychoactive effect or hallucinogenic effect. While it currently is being recognized for its medicinal use in many Western countries for such things as cancer, it recently was recognized regionally as a treatment for glaucoma.

Cannabis is non-addictive. Between l850 and 1937, marijuana was used as a treatment for a wide range of conditions, from insanity to gout. During the American Prohibition (1920s and 1930s), recreational use of marijuana became widespread as a response to the lack of alcohol.

Depressants: Barbiturates and tranquilizers such as Librium and Valium are categorized in this class.

These drugs are used to produce sedation, to induce sleep, to combat anxiety and to treat epilepsy. Excessive doses cause a drunken-like state and have side effects similar to alcohol, including a hangover.

Hallucinogens: This class includes LSD (Lysergic Acid Diethylamide), mescaline and peyote. These drugs are often described as psychoactive, that is affecting the mind. While hallucination is common, other effects of the drugs depend upon the conditions surrounding the taker while using the drugs.

LSD is sometimes used in psychotherapy, but its ultimate effectiveness has not yet been established. These drugs are non- addictive.

Peyote has been used in American Indian rituals since before America was discovered by Europeans. LSD was discovered in l938 and has been regulated since the early l950s.

Narcotics: It can be divided into two groups -- opiates, including opium, heroine, morphine and codeine -- which are derived from the opium poppy and nonopiate synthetic narcotics such as Demerol and Methadone.

Their major medicinal use is as a painkiller and a tranquilizer. Outside of medicine, the recreational use of the drugs produces euphoria, although the exact pleasure effect has not been identified.

All narcotics are physically addicting, depending upon the drug, the frequency and duration of its usage, and its dosage. Symptoms of withdrawal from the addiction include weakness, depression, nausea, vomiting, irritability, insomnia and anorexia.

Stimulants: This group includes cocaine, a drug extracted from the leaves of the South American coca plant, amphetamines, synthetic drugs which first developed during the l800s, and other amphetamine-like synthetic drugs. These drugs stimulate the central nervous system and are used medicinally to combat depression and narcolepsy. Excessive doses produce hyperactivity, paranoia and other psychotic symptoms.

Drug abuse: This is the repeated or uncontrolled use of controlled substances.

Drug abuse can cause permanent damage not only to ourselves but also to our society:

* To Ourselves

- Drug abuse can change the personality of a user drastically like changing moods from what used to be a happy person into a very angry person.

- Drug abuse makes the user unconscious to themselves, their society and makes them apthetic about anything else besides their drug habit.

- A lack of working spirit and sometimes mental problems because of chemical reactions from the drugs.

- They will do anything including trespassing the law or social norms in order to get what they want.

- They will not hesitate to hurt themselves in order to release the pain from drug addiction, which can lead to death.

* To Family

- Drug abusers often lack repspect for others, even in their homes and toward their parents and will do any act of violence in order to get what they want.

- They are careless about possessions such as cars; they lose their sense of belonging and give bad names to their families.

- They waste a lot of money in the treatment and recovery time.

* To the Nation

- The loss of the young generation from a nation which is built upon the hopes of the young people, because they hold the key to continue the nation.

But, we (current generation) have a more insidious danger related to drug abuse, which is HIV/AIDS because one of the most common transmission methods of the virus is by sharing of needles.

In Indonesia in the year 2000, an assessment of HIV infection in eight cities revealed that 70 percent of victims were below 24 years of age. By the year 2001, the Ministry of Health estimated one million drug users, 60 percent of whom were injecting drug users, of which 70 percent share needles and 15 percent are HIV/AIDS positive.

Recommendations and action plan

At the conclusion of the Asian Youth Congress on Drug Abuse Prevention, held in Sanur, Bali, from Aug. 26 to Aug. 29, hundreds of young participants pledged to adopt and uphold the following recommendations and action plan:

1. We, as the young generation, pledge to be united against drugs, despite our differences in culture.

2. We are committed to avoiding gateway drugs and stand firm in our decision to say "no" to drugs.

3. We vow not to treat drug addicts as criminals but as human beings and to always be supportive of people who want to be free of drugs.

4. We promise to be active and proactive and to create and implement effective activities for drug abuse prevention.

It is our intention to make this pledge a reality not only on paper, but also through our actions. The first step will be sharing what we have experienced here with our peers back at home.

The congress yielded several recommendations and action plans as followed:

School-based programs

*Recommendations:

- Principals and teachers need to be trained in drug prevention education and they should be drug and tobacco free.

- There should be drug prevention counseling centers at every school.

- Information on the dangers of drug use should be made available at all schools not just those in the capital. * Action plan:

- To participate actively in the formulation of school-based programs.

- To volunteer in regional areas to provide information and counseling for students who don't have access to drug prevention information.

What can young people do?

* Recommendations:

- There should be a balance of cooperation between the schools, the communities, homes, etc.

- People of influence who can provide moral support, financing and facilities need to back up the youth. Nevertheless, young people should also be active in raising funds and resources.

- The youth should be taken seriously and included as competent stakeholders in the fight against drugs.

* Action plans:

- To help in reducing the use of drugs, including alcohol, in people who are addicted.

- To use music, movies, computers and other means to increase the impact of prevention efforts and make prevention something the youth want to be a part of.

Media Literacy

* Recommendations:

- Media makers should not display mixed messages that warn of the dangers of drugs, both legal and illegal, while at the same time glorifying but not showing the real effect they have on users.

- Education that helps youth interpret the real meaning of media messages need to be included in prevention efforts.

* Action plan:

- To view the media not simply as consumers but as discerning individuals who can understand the intention of both advertisers and other media-makers and thus protect ourselves against pro- drug abuse tendencies.