The Role Of Drug Abuse In The United States

Ever since there have been drugs introduced into the United States, there have been people to abuse them; ever since there have been people to abuse drugs, there have been other people fighting against drug abusers. All throughout history people's minds have being changing and people have become smarter and the ways of thinking have changed therefore making the fight against drug abusers a constantly changing battle. There have been many different approaches taken by many different types of people because drug users can be anybody. The largest movements against drugs taken in the United States were led by the government. During the late 1980's and early 1990's the large decline of drug abuse can be accredited to the lack of media coverage of
drugs and their abuse. Drug use in the United States goes back over one-hundred years. As early as 1868, a professor at the University of Pennsylvania, Dr. George Wood, wrote this about the pharmacological effects of opium,
"A sensation of fullness is felt in the head, soon to be followed by a universal feeling of delicious ease and comfort, with an elevation and expansion of the whole moral and intellectual nature, which is, I think, the most characteristic of its effects. . . . It seems to make the individual, for the time, a better and greater man. . . . The hallucinations, the delirious imaginations of alcoholic intoxication, are, in general, quite wanting. Along with this emotional and intellectual elevation, there is also increased muscular energy; and the capacity to act, and to bear fatigue, is greatly augmented." (Ryan, 2004:D-R.org/drughistory.php)
At first, when opium and pure cocaine were introduced into the United States, they were brought in and used as anesthetics during surgery or other medical procedures. Cocaine was used as