Drugs: The Good and the Bad

Americans rely on medications to keep them healthy. We take drugs to get rid of infections, to ease aches and pains, and to lower blood pressure. Some people use drugs to keep themselves out of wheel chairs for as long as possible (multiple sclerosis), or to keep themselves out of nursing homes (alzheimer’s). And still others need drugs to keep them alive. For example, many of those who suffer from cancer, diabetes, or HIV/AIDS rely on drugs for their very existence.

Although medications or “wonder drugs” (as you may have heard them called) can be essential to a healthy life, I think everyone will agree that there are also drugs that people abuse. These drugs include everything from steroids to heroin to marijuana to inhalants.

Drug abuse doesn’t limit itself to adults either. It’s a sad fact; countless teens use these drugs for the wrong purposes. Although drug abuse among this age group is decreasing, many still choose to abuse. In fact, one organization, Teen First Aid, states that 12% of 8th graders use marijuana!

A new publication from Scholastic, in conjunction with the scientists of the National Institute on Drug Abuse, the National Institutes of Health, and the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, outlines the effects of different drugs on a teenager’s body.

First and foremost, people need to understand that a teen’s body suffers greatly from drug abuse. According to the poster, Drugs and the Body – It Isn’t Pretty, the following are effects on the teen brain caused by specific drugs:

Inhalants – Can shrink the part of the brain that controls movement.
Marijuana – Can impair short-term memory
Methamphetamine – Can change the actual structure of the brain, altering emotion, memory and motivation.
Ecstasy – Negatively affects serotonin (mood).

Of course the brain isn’t the only part of a teen’s body that suffers from drug abuse. The heart, skin, immune system, liver, kidney, lungs, and even the bones are negatively affected.

Here is a sampling of some of those effects, and the drugs that cause them:

Ecstasy – Increases risk kidney failure.
Steroids – Keeps bones from growing.
Marijuana – Coats the lungs in a sticky substance.
Tobacco (chewing) – Can lead to cancers of the mouth, gum disease, and decaying teeth.
Inhalants – Disrupt normal heart rhythms.
Cocaine – Causes heart attacks.
Needle-sharing – Can transmit HIV infection.

In addition to using the drugs listed above, thousands of teens across the country abuse prescription medication. NIDA for Teens describes prescription drug abuse as “…when someone takes a medication that was prescribed for someone else or takes their own prescription in a manner or dosage other than what was prescribed. Abuse can include taking a friend’s or relative’s prescription…”

This growing trend – to abuse prescription drugs – is spreading like wild fire. The same source above states that “in 2008, 1.9 million youth (or 7.7 percent) age 12 to 17 abused prescription drugs…”

As I said in the beginning, medications do save lives, but they can also negatively affect the lives of the teens who abuse them.

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