Society's Most Harmful, Widely-Advertised Drug

Share/Save Share this

Sexy Skyy vodka adA recently-published study in The Lancet concludes that alcohol is the most socially-harmful drug, even more harmful than crack cocaine or heroin. The study's authors scored 20 drugs on 16 criteria, nine of which related to the harms that a particular drug does to an individual, and seven related to the harms a drug does to others. The criteria examined the social, physical and psychological problems each drug causes. They scored the drugs on a 100-point scale, with higher numbers given to the most problematic drugs. Alcohol got the highest score at 72 points, due to its medical and overall societal effects, including drunk driving. Heroin came in second, with 55 points, and crack cocaine was third with 54 points. About 17.6 million adults in the U.S. are either alcoholics or have problems caused by alcohol, yet alcohol is widely advertised using humor, hip themes, animals, sexuality and even free samples. Alcohol is also a legal drug, and people often equate "legal" with "safe." Since alcohol is socially-sanctioned, easy to access and doesn't bear the same stigma of illegal drugs, many people don't perceive that an increased use of alcohol is a problem, leading it to, in fact, be a problem.

Comments

cocaine must be prohibited

yes these cocktail parties are creating too much bad scenes... specially when you use drugs in it... And when you get drunk or get drugs than you wont be in your senses and than nobody knows what you gonna do than... so instead of loosing control on your self...try to avoid it... its a serious matter..please try to avoid. Wanduhren

alcohol

I have been an addiction therapist for 40 years, The article about the Lancet report was excellent and to the point.