DRUG ADDICTION

BIOLOGY PROJECT

SUBMITTED BY
KARTHIKEYA.R
CLASS 12A2
ROLL NO 15
What is a Drug?
Any substance, other than food, used in the prevention,
diagnosis, all aviation or treatment of a disease is called a
drug. A drug may also be defined as a chemical which, when
taken in some way after the body function. Drug is also known
as a medicine. Generally, the term drugs applied to any
stimulating or depressing substance that can be habituating or
addictive.

Meaning of Addiction:
Addiction is the habitual, psychological and physiological
dependence on a substance or practice. Which is beyond
voluntary control? A person who is habituated to a substance
or a practice, especially a harmful one, is called an addict.

Project Report on Drugs Dependence:

Drugs are prescribed by physicians for the prevention or
treatment of diseases, or for increasing the physical and
mental performance and are withdrawn as soon as the
desired effect is achieved. Repeated use of certain drugs on a
periodic or continuous basis may make the body dependence.
Such drugs are called psychotropic rugs. They act on the brain
and alter behavior, consciousness and capacity of perception.
Hence, they are also termed mood-altering drugs. Some
people start taking drugs without medical advice due to one
reason or the other and become drugs dependent.
Classification of Drugs
There are a large number of drugs on which people become
dependent. These are classifies into four major groups :
sedatives and tranquillizers, opiate narcotics, stimulations and
hallucinogens.

Type of Drug Examples Effect

Sedatives and Barbiturates, Depress CNS activity give

Tranquillizers Benzodiazepines feeling of calmness,
relaxation, drowsiness.
Opiate Narcotics Opium,Morphine,codeine, Suppress brain activity
Heroin Relaxed pain.
Stimulants Amphetamines, Caffeine, Make a person more
Cocaine wakeful, alert and active,
cause excitement.
Hallucinogens LSQ, Mescalin, Alter thoughts, feeling and
psilocybin, Ganja, chares, perceptions.
Hashish.

Combinations of Drugs and Alcohol:

Some addicts use mixtures of drugs to have immediate ‘kid’ or

‘charge’. Simultaneous use of drug and alcohol may produce
dangerous effects, including death. When barbiturates and
alcohol are taken together, each doubles the effect of the
other. A mixture of cocaine and heroin called speed ball, gives
spontaneous kick of cocaine and prolonged pleasure of heroin.
 Combination Effect

Alcohol + Barbiturates Markedly increased depressant

effect.
Alcohol + Antihistamines Marked drowsiness
Alcohol + Valium Dramatically increases sedative
effect.
Alcohol + Marijuana or Hashish Decreased coordination increased
reaction time impaired judgment.
Alcohol + Aspirin Increased changes of damage to
gastric mucosa.

How drug addiction Begins?

There are many factors that lead people to drug addiction.
1. Curiosity: Frequent references to drugs by public media
create curiosity for having a personal experience of the drugs.
2. Friend’s pressure: Frequent appreciation of drug experience
by friends allures others to start the use of drugs.
3. Frustration and Depression: Some people start taking drugs
to get relief from frustration and depression.
4. Desire for More Work: Students sometimes take drugs to
keep awake the whole night to prepare for examination. It is
not desirable as it may cause mental breakdown.
5. Looking for a Different World: A wrong notion that the
drugs open up a new world tempts some young actors to start
taking-drugs.
6. Relief from Pain: A prolonged use of pain-relieving drugs
with physician’s advice at times leads to addiction.
 7. Family History: Children may take to drugs by seeing their
elders in the family.
8. Excitement and Adventure: The young take to drugs to
satisfy their instinct for excitement and adventure.

Social Disease - Smoking, Drinking and Use of

Drugs
Smoking and drinking and use of drugs frequently or regularly
are social diseases. They adversely affect the health of the
addicts and the society. Young people take to these habits for
fun, show off or curiosity, as an adventure or feeling of
freedom, or as a gesture of defiance against the elders who
themselves indulge in these activities but check the youngsters.
Other factors that make people take to these vices are inability
to face problems of life indifference shown by members of the
family, and encouragement or pressure by friends. Temporary
escape from the life problems and mental relaxation felt on
taking the drugs in the beginning increase persons interest in
them. Soon they become habitual and find in difficult to leave.
The daily dose to get the desired effect increases with time.
As in other countries, the menace of drug addiction is
spreading in India also. A large number of our young men and
women have taken to intoxicants. About 87.6 per cent drug
addicts are between the ages of 14 and 25 years.
Tobacco
Sources:
It is a native of South Africa, where the Red Indian first started
smoking. Now the tobacco plant has spread the world over. It
has large, quote to Lancelot leaves and terminal clusters of
tubular, white or pink flowers.

Project Report on Drugs Addiction

Modes of Use:
Tobacco is used for smoking, chewing and snuffing. Its main
stimulating component is poisonous volatile alkali nicotine,
which causes addiction. Nicotine synthesis occurs in the roots
of the plant but it is stored in the leaves. The leaves contain 2
to 8% nicotine. Inhaling tobacco smoke from cigars, cigarettes,
biddies, pipes and hubble-bubble is called smoking. Cigar is a
roll of tobacco leaf. Cigarette is cut tobacco wrapped in paper.
Bide is tobacco wrapped. In a piece of leaf. Tobacco smoke is
drawn directly from pipe and through water is hubble-bubble.
Smoking may give some temporary relief to the strained nerves
but in the long run it proves a dangerous health hazard. The
quantity of nicotine contained in one cigar may prove fatal if
injected intravenously into a person. When smoked only 10%
of the smoke is inhaled. Hence, no immediate ill effect is
observed. Smokers may develop a physiological craving for
nicotine and then they cannot give up smoking.
Effect of Nicotine:
Nicotine is a low concentration.
(i) Stimulates conduction of nerve impulses.
(ii) Relaxes the muscles.
(iii) Releases adrenaline, increasing heart beat rate and
pressure.
(iv) Increased blood pressure due to smoking chances the risk
of heart diseases.
(v) Retards fetal growth in expecting mothers and
(vi) Causes tobacco addiction. High concentration of nicotine
paralyses nerve cells.
Other Harmful components of Tobacco Smoke :
Besides the poisonous nicotine, the tobacco smoke contains
carbon-monoxide, polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons and tar.
Other Effects:
(i) Smoking affects economy:
A smoker not only waste money, but also runs risk of burns and
fires.
(ii) Smoking mars personality:
Teeth may become stained. Lips may get discolored and breath
becomes foul. A person with a cigarette hanging from the
mouth look odd.
(iii) Smoking is annoying to others:
Cigarette smoke is quite annoying to non-smokers. It may
prove even more harmful to them. A smoker should avoid
smoking. When in the company of non smokers. A smoker
makes the person nearby person’s passive smokers through
inhaling smoke released by him.
Alcohol:
Sources:
Ethyl alcohol, or ethanol, flammable, colorless liquid having a
penetrating odour and burning taste. It is one of the products
of the distillation of fermented grains, fruit juices and starches
with the help of yeast enzymes. It is the principal constituent
and the in toxicating principle of wines.
Modes of Use:
Alcohol is taken in low concentration, as the beer, toddy and
wine and in relatively high concentration as arrack, brandy,
whisky, rum, gin, vodka etc.
Addition:
Addition to alcohol is called alcoholism. Alcoholics are found in
all society section of society. Alcohol causes intoxication and
thus, acts as a poison. They drinkers begin with small doses,
but many of them soon start consuming large doses and
become addicts. By the time they realize that drinking in
adversely affecting them; it is too late to give it up.
Why People Take to Drinking:
The drinkers offer one or more of the following reasons for
starting drinking.
1) Social pressure
2) Desire for excitement
3) Feeling of independence
4) Liking of taste
5) Desire to escape from such realities of life as
disappointments and failures and
What Happens while Alcohol intake:
Alcohol is quickly absorbed in the stomach and upper part of
small intestine and reaches all the tissues in minutes. Its
oxidation starts at once and a large amount of heat in
produced. Since heat is not needed in the body, it is taken up
by the blood and carried to the skin for dissipation. Since the
receptors of heat are located in the skin, the rush of blood to
the skin gives a false impression of warmth in the body. The
blood supply of internal organs is greatly reduced resulting in
fall of temperature in them. Energy released by alcohol is not
used in any life process. Rather the energy derived from food
is used up in ridding the body of excess heat.
Is Alcohol A Stimulant?
Many people take alcohol for stimulation. Actually alcohol is
a depressant, a substance which dulls the senses. It reduces
the efficiency of every tissue the body. Any feeling of lift a
person may claim to feel is a mistaken impression or an
attempt to justify the act in his own mind.