Question

smoking, illicit drugs, and alcoholism. Pick one of the three and discuss it thoroughly. Include the following issues such as legal, economic, incidence, prevalence, effects, treatment, and prevention.

Answer 1

Ans) The illicit drug problem can be divided into three categories: first, those illicit drugs that are
either produced or processed from natural plant products such as opium poppy: opium, morphineand heroin; secondly, synthetically produced illicit drugs, such as amphetamine; and thirdly, psychoactive pharmaceutical drugs that become illicit as a result of being diverted from licit uses or purposes.

- It is concerned primarily with the first and, to a lesser extent, the second category. The third category is not considered here, not because knowledge about it is scant, but because its economic and social impact is quite different from the other two categories.

- An earlier version of the present study was prepared for the Commission on Narcotic Drugs
at its thirty-eighth session in 1995.

- The Expert Group adopted a set of recommendations that were presented to the
General Assembly at its forty-fifth session in 1991. In 1993, the Assembly, in its resolution
48/112, recommended that the Commission should consider including the issue of the economic and social consequences of drug abuse and illicit trafficking as an item on its agenda.

- After the submission of the earlier version of this study to the Commission on Narcotic
Drugs, it was clear that the issues it covered were of relevance to a broader cross-section of the international community. Indeed, UNDCP has during the intervening period prepared, including several reports submitted to the World Summit on Social Development held at Copenhagen.
- It was on the basis of continued interest in the economic and social consequences of the illicit drug problem that the present report has been revised and published under the UNDCP Technical Series.
- Assessing the economic and social consequences of illicit drug abuse and trafficking, however, implies first, that some measure of the magnitude of the problem is available and secondly, that there is some conceptual clarity about the nature of the consequences of these activities.

- As knowledge stands, neither of those requirements is fulfilled. Estimates of the extent
of illicit drug production, distribution and consumption vary enormously, and are often contingent upon the methodology and political orientation of the observer. Work on setting international comparative standards for measuring the economic and social consequences of drug abuse is only
just beginning and, given the complex nature of the problem, will evolve slowly.
- The sources of the present study are thus as varied as its subject matter. The need to expand
the information base for such conceptual initiatives is clear, for there can be analytical drawbacks in relying solely on official figures. When official statistics do not fully or accurately reflect drug related trends, there is a case for cautious use of unofficial data as long as any and all unofficial sources are clearly recognized and documented as such from the outset.

- Official sources can, in some cases, be out of date or focus more on the symptoms or effects of drug abuse and trafficking rather than the underlying causes.

- Furthermore, in most cases, official statistics focus mainly on country-level situations and the cross-national dimension is not always discernible. It uses unofficial data where appropriate, but clearly cites and documents their use.