COMMENT POSTED TO AN ARTICLE IN THE GUARDIAN
Could a heroin vaccine
cure the west’s drug epidemic?
I don't know that it is accurate to call heroin addiction a
social issue.
Of course, it has social effects.
But I think the original impulse is escape, escape from many
serious mental afflictions as well as escape from the often-unending dreariness
of life for many.
There has always been this kind of activity, going back to
the cheap-gin fueled Industrial Revolution.
Life can be exceedingly drab and difficult for many. Not
intelligent enough to get an interesting job. Too ugly to attract the opposite
sex. Too painful from many physical and mental conditions. Or just feeling
oppressed with life at home or a highly unsuitable spouse.
That fact is just part of the human condition.
I cannot condemn many who take drugs, and I well know we
have neither the resources or magic to change their lives.
It is an important footnote on any discussion of this to
remember that when the United States needlessly invaded Afghanistan, they
destroyed the harsh control over growing opium poppies imposed previously by
the Taliban.
Supplies soon shot up all over, price went down, more
addicts resulted, and drug gang wars in cities of the United States were
intensified.
It is often said, and I don't know the truth but do suspect
there is some truth, that the CIA has used the drug trade in Afghanistan as a
nice source of off-the-books income.
