ABSTRACT

The use of drugs to create a sense of well-being has been a feature of many cultures throughout the centuries. Within our own culture the use of alcohol and tobacco has been quite acceptable for many years, although health concerns around the use of tobacco are now greatly reducing its acceptability. For almost as long, the use of illicit drugs has been an accepted part of life for the literary elite, as Thomas De Quincy’s Confessions of an English Opium-Eater testifies. However, in the past forty years the use of illicit drugs such as heroin, cocaine and cannabis has shown a dramatic increase and has become endemic in certain parts of Western culture. For instance, in the UK 30% of 15 year olds reported misusing drugs in 2009 (Health and Social Care Information Centre 2011), and in Canada 13% reported trying substances such as glue, hallucinogens and amphetamines (Hammond et al. 2011). There are real risks that misuse of drugs leads to criminal behaviour, with one survey showing that young people who had misused drugs in the past year were over twice as likely to have committed an offence compared with those who reported not having used drugs (Information Centre 2006). In addition, although drug misuse has traditionally been seen as a male behaviour, in recent years the rate of misuse amongst women has increased dramatically (Greenfield et al. 2010).