Drugs By: Nick Butts, Jack Carmusin, Mark Blauer, Charles Sporn

What are drugs?  Drugs are chemicals that change the way a person's body works.  The types of drugs that average people are in everyday contact with are medicinal drugs, illegal drugs, cigarettes and alcohol.

Medicinal Drugs  Medicines are legal drugs, meaning doctors are allowed to prescribe them for patients, stores can sell them, and people are allowed to buy them.  It is not legal, or safe, for people to use these medicines any way they want or to buy them from people who are selling them illegally.

Cigarettes and Alcohol  Cigarettes and alcohol are two other kinds of legal drugs. (In the United States, adults 18 and older can buy cigarettes and those 21 and older can buy alcohol.)  Of course, these two things are very bad for your health and should not be done in excess.

Illegal drugs  When people talk about a "drug problem," they usually mean abusing legal drugs or using illegal drugs.  These drugs include: marijuana, cocaine, ecstasy, heroin, and LSD.  Illegal drugs can damage the brain, heart, and other important organs

Consequences of illegal drug use  Illegal drugs -- such as heroin, marijuana, cocaine and methamphetamine -- inflict serious damage upon America and its citizens every year. Accidents, crime, domestic violence, illness, lost opportunity, and reduced productivity are the direct consequences of substance abuse.  Illegal drugs cost our society approximately $110 billion each year.  Spreading of infectious diseases, Cost of drug abuse to workplace productivity, Homelessness

Substance abuse  Substance abuse is characterized by the use of a mood- or behavior-altering substance in a maladaptive pattern resulting in significant impairment or distress.  Specific disorders are named for their etiology, such as alcohol abuse and anabolic steroid abuse. DSM-IV includes specific abuse disorders for alcohol, amphetamines or similar substances, cannabis, cocaine, hallucinogens, inhalants, opioids, PCP or similar substances, and sedatives, hypnotics, or anxiolytics.

How to overcome substance abuse  Develop an Education Based Model  Provide Treatment on Demand  Teachers and Parents: Recognize the Symptoms  Alert Children to Negative Consequences

Bibliography  Consequences of illegal drug use. (n.d.). Retrieved November 22, 2010, from  Koolbreeze, A. L., III. (2010, November 3). Ways to fight drug abuse. Retrieved from  Re search Library. (n.d.). Dorland's medical dictionary for healthcare consumers. Retrieved from cns_hl_dorlands_split.jsp?pg=/ppdocs/us/co mmon/dorlands/dorland/one/ htm  What you need to know about drugs. (n.d.). Retrieved from kid/grow/drugs_alcohol/know_drugs.html