ABSTRACT
This chapter explores the legacy of how opiate addiction has been defined primarily as a moral failure and medical condition from the 1980's through the early twenty-first century in the United States. It also explores the interplay between government agencies, the medical profession, and treatment interventions, as well as the emergence of stakeholders. And previously peripheral to the medicalization of opiate addiction, including pharmaceutical companies, public health, and health service researchers. The introduction of a medical substitute (such as morphine or methadone), although originally envisioned as a solution, instead engendered new problems. For example, the use of morphine to treat both alcoholism and opium addiction led to the emergence of morphine addiction. "The harm reduction policy of Switzerland and its emphasis on the medicalization of the heroin problem seems to have contributed to the image of heroin as unattractive for young people".
