Many people think that just because they are not buying illicit drugs behind the garage in the alley, they can never be a person who is addicted to a drug. Unfortunately, they are sadly mistaken. The most serious drug problems in the United States is the addiction of people to their prescription pain medication. The death rate is 45 people that are killed each day from these prescription drugs, compared to 20 people per day that die from cocaine and heroin.
Drug addiction is defined as a condition where a person loses control in regard to a drug that they are taking and they are in a situation where they always want more of the drug because of its pleasurable results when taken by the individual. Curiosity is also a cause for many people to start taking these drugs.
Pain is relieved by opioids because of their minimizing of the pain intensity interrupting the signals of pain that reach the brain. They also affect the areas of the brain that control our emotions. If the drugs are taken strictly for pain, and for that reason only, a person is not likely to become addicted, because once the pain is relieved, they stop taking the drug.
However, when the drug is taken in a higher doses, by injection or orally, they have an intoxicating high result.
Painkilling drugs have become an increasingly more problematic situation and health concern. A person who is an addict will compulsively use the drug and that compulsion cannot be overcome without treatment professionally. If they are not treated their lives become focused entirely on getting more of the drug. If not arrested, the habit can be fatal.
These medications do have very difficult withdrawal symptoms and a person will need a professional detox program to successfully get off of the drug.
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