Drugs::Part I

The latest drug drama of Rahul Mahajan and Vivek Moitra has created a wave of excitement in India about drugs and drug abuse. I have been reading about this in every newspaper I pick up for the last 3 days. But I doubt how many of us actually know about drugs, other than that they are banned by law the world over and would put you in prison for using or abetting their use. So I decided to explore the world of drugs in this post. I am sure this post is going to start a series on this blog about drugs. Anyone who would like to contribute more funda is welcome. Please write to me. By the way, if you are still not sure what type of drugs I am going to discuss,let me put it straight: I am going to talk about narcotics drugs which are different from the conventional medical drugs available from the medical stores.

In the first part of the series, I attempt to find out about what “drugs” are.

Let us start our discussion with the word narcosis. My WordWeb desktop dictionary says “Unconsciousness induced by narcotics or anaesthesia”. Tracing more on this, I find Wikipedia saying that the term narcotic has a Greek origin, derived from the word narkotikos, meaning "benumbing or deadening," originally referred to a variety of substances that induced sleep.

Hmmm…sounds interesting. So drugs or narcotic drugs (better), are substances that can modify the way the body and mind work. That is to say, they can bring about a whole range of changes from the nervous system to the chemical mechanisms of the body. Many people thus believe that using narcotics they can cure or heal many diseases of the mind and the body and hence start talking them. Since the narcotics bring about biological changes in the body, the body becomes the slave of these external chemicals and begins to show abnormal functionalities in their absence. This is when a person becomes addicted to narcotics and we call him a drug addict.

There are 364 different types of controlled substances in the US whose use and trade without authorisation is illegal (check here). Many of these are not widely known or used. The most famous of the drugs are Cocaine, Quinine, Marijuana, Opium, Heroin and Methamphetamine.

Narcotics can be administered in a variety of ways. Some are taken orally, transdermally (skin patches) or injected. They are also available in suppositories. As recreational drugs, they are often smoked, snorted, or self-administered by the more direct routes of subcutaneous ("skin popping") and intravenous ("mainlining") injection.

The market for the illegal narcotic drugs is very difficult to estimate. The drug trade is pernicious and large. United Nations Office of Drugs and Crime(UNODC) estimates its retail value at US$ 321bn. In 2005 World Drug Report, the UNODC estimates that 200 million people, or 5% of the global population age 15-64, have consumed illicit drugs at least once in the last 12 months.

Table::Extent of drug use (annual prevalence*) estimates 2003/04
	All Illicit drugs	Cannabis	Amphetamine-type stimulants		Cocaine	Opiates	of which heroin
			Amphetamines	Ecstasy
(million people)	200	160.9	26.2	7.9	13.7	15.9	10.6
in % of global population age 15-64	5.00%	4.00%	0.60%	0.20%	0.30%	0.40%	0.20%
Source: UNODC

The market for various drugs has been estimated by UNODC on the basis of treatment demands. Using the various sources, the UNODC has come up with the following map which shows the distribution of various drugs geographically. Click here to see map

According to the CIA World Fact book, the US is world's largest consumer of cocaine, shipped from Colombia through Mexico and the Caribbean. The consumption of methamphetamine from Mexico is rapidly increasing. the US is also a big market for of high-quality Southeast Asian heroin. It is also known as a illicit producer of cannabis, marijuana, depressants, stimulants, hallucinogen, and methamphetamine.

Afganisthan is world's largest producer of opium. But due to the recent wars, cultivation dropped 48% to 107,400 hectares in 2005. But better weather and lack of widespread disease returned opium yields to normal levels, meaning potential opium production declined by only 10% to 4,475 metric tons. The CIA estimates that if the entire poppy crop were processed, it would produce 526 metric tons of heroin. Afganisthan is also the source of hashish. There are many narcotics-processing labs throughout the country. 80-90% of the heroin consumed in Europe comes from Afghan opium. Due to high profits and lex government regulation, Afganisthan is the heart of heroin trafficking which is the source of funds to various terrorists groups operating from the country.

Although India is world's largest producer of licit opium for the pharmaceutical trade, but an undetermined quantity of opium is diverted to illicit international drug markets. India is also the transit point for the various illicit narcotics produced in neighbouring countries. India is well-known for the illicit production of methaqualone and it is considered vulnerable to narcotics money laundering through the hawala system.

Sources: CIA fact book, UNODC, Wikipedia and newspapers