Did you know researchers recently declared alcohol more lethal than heroin and crack cocaine? Me either.
photo/myspace.com
A report was published in the major medical journal, Lancet. It stated that illegal drugs hurt users more physically, yet alcohol, heroin and cocaine have greater social effects.
Researchers came to this conclusion by analyzing how addictive a drug is and how it harms the body; the environmental damage caused by the drug; its role in breaking up families and the economic costs—health care, social services and prison.
Know why alcohol scored so high? Because most of us drink, it’s socially acceptable aaaand … has devastating consequences for those who drink too much and those around them.
Drinking alcohol in excess damages nearly all organ systems; it’s connected to higher death rates and is involved in greater percentage of crime than most other drugs, including heroin.
“Just think about what happens at every football game,” rants Wim van den Brink, professor of psychiatry and addiction at the University of Amsterdam.
Still, experts call out that it would be impractical to “ban the booze.”
“We cannot return to the days of prohibition,” states Leslie King, advisor to the European Monitoring Centre for Drugs and one of the study’s authors. “Alcohol is too embedded in our culture and it won’t go away.”
He feels that countries should target problem drinkers, develop education programs, raise the price of alcohol so it’s not as widely available.
Is that a fact?
May Your Glass Always Be Half Full
Read a chapter of Maxi’s coming novel
Over the Edge
http://maximalone.com
