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Kaci Watts

Rebecca Morean

English 1201 515

24 March 2020

Literature Review

My essay is about how addiction and chemical dependency is affecting the United States.

The sources that I have chosen discuss that very thing. Addiction and chemical dependency have

become more prevalent as it has become easy to access. All the sources have quite a few key

points in common. The articles repeated the common ideas that due to addiction, opioid

addiction specifically, has been the reason for thousands of deaths across the country. Editor and

author, Natalia Gurevich, wrote in “Opioid Addiction” that, “the crisis has exacted a massive

human and economic toll, experts say. From 1999 to 2017, almost 218,000 Americans died from

overdoses related to prescription opioids, according to the Centers for Disease Control and

Prevention (CDC).” A similar analysis is made by Pamela Michaels in the article,

“Drug/Substance Abuse.” She writes that “about 200,000 individuals die annually as a result of

drug use, with the highest overall mortality rate among heroin and cocaine users.” Some other

common ideas are that the youth of America have become increasingly addicted to opioids and

other substances, substance abuse is not only affecting America but the rest of the world, and it is

becoming an epidemic.

Although the sources have multiple common ideas or key ideas, they do have a one

disagreement. The article written by Pei Lin Lua and Nor Samira Talib analyzes substance abuse

in Malaysia not the United States. I believe gives some perspective in the eyes of a person from

another country compared to the situation in the United States. This article has different facts and
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information while the others all have similar information pertaining to deaths, drug use, etc. The

rest of the articles do center around America and look at it only. I didn’t find any other

disagreements within the articles other than that. The other articles are about different aspects of

drug addiction or substance abuse.

The purposes of the sources used are all to dig further into the phenomena that is

substance abuse and how it has affected not only the United States, but the whole world. Drug

addiction has become increasingly common, but the effects of it aren’t always shown. The

articles are here to show how the use of drugs and illegal substances have not only destroyed

lives but changed the United States forever. The articles may intend to spread accurate

information, but they do not stop the multitude misconceptions about substance abuse. One

misconception is that drug addiction is as prevalent as common diseases, like diabetes. That is

very wrong. Although drug abuse is very widespread it is not as common as a disease like

diabetes, but in “Young Adults’ Opioid Prescription History and Opioid Misuse Perceptions,” by

Alexa Romberg writes that “In 2016, more than 11.5 million people in the US aged 12 and over

misused prescription opioids.” That is an enormous number of Americans to have abused

opioids, but that is not quite on the scale of diabetes.

Misconceptions or myths about drug addiction are common. Not many people know

exactly how drug use affects the person and their life. So many people believe that it is a choice,

but that is not true. The person does start out by choosing to try the substance, but eventually the

drug of their choice destroys them and takes over their life. Dana A, Glei, doctor in sociology

and research investigator, states in her article, “Drug and Alcohol Abuse: the Role of Economic

Insecurity,” that a lot of times due to stress people will turn to substances such as drugs and

alcohol to help mask that pain. Those Americans struggle with finding a stable source of income
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causing them to be in distress, which is a factor in their decision to turn to illegal substances. It is

a choice at first, but those individuals just want to mask the pain and end up no being able to let

go of those substances.

My research question does not truly have an answer to solve the issue. There are multiple

ways that the substance abuse epidemic is hurting the United States. The economy,

unemployment, and medical field are being affected by the epidemic. The unemployment rate

correlates to the percentage of drug addicts in America but adding a level of distress to the

people. More than plenty of Americans don’t know how to handle stress and financial issues, so

they turn to substances that can take that stress away and help them forget. Same goes for mental

illnesses because millions of U.S. citizens struggle with mental illness and don’t know how to

deal with it, so they end up numbing themselves with the help of drugs or alcohol. The economy

takes a hit from drug abuse because people go down that route to either make easy money by

selling those substances or using making themselves go deeper in debt. Most drug addicts can’t

hold a stable job, so they end up putting themselves in debt or their loved ones. Finally, the

medical field is affected by the amount of cases that come in from overdoses and drug related

issues/deaths. There isn’t a clear answer to solve the substance abuse epidemic in the United

States, but there are several aspects in America that are affected.
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Works Cited

Glei, Dana A., and Maxine Weinstein. “Drug and Alcohol Abuse: The Role of Economic

Insecurity.” American Journal of Health Behavior, vol. 43, no. 4, July 2019, pp. 838

–857. EBSCOhost, doi:10.5993/AJHB.43.4.16. Accessed 24 Mar. 2020.

Gurevich, Natalia. "Opioid Addiction." CQ Researcher, 24 July 2019,

library.cqpress.com/cqresearcher/cqr_ht_opioids_2019. Accessed 24 Mar. 2020.

Michaels, Pamela. “Drug/Substance Abuse.” Worldmark Global Health and Medicine Issues,

edited by K. Lee Lerner, 1st ed., Gale, Farmington, MI, 2016. Credo Reference,

sinclair.ohionet.org/login?url=https://search-credoreference-

com.sinclair.ohionet.org/content/entry/galewhami/drug_substance_abuse/0. Accessed 24

Mar. 2020.

Pei Lin Lua, and Nor Samira Talib. “Auricular Acupuncture for Drug Dependence: An Open

-Label Randomized Investigation on Clinical Outcomes, Health-Related Quality of Life,

and Patient Acceptability.” Alternative Therapies in Health & Medicine, vol. 19, no. 4,

July 2013, pp. 28–42. EBSCOhost,

search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&db=awh&AN=89450072&site=ehost-live.

Accessed 24 Mar. 2020.

Romberg, Alexa R., et al. “Young Adults’ Opioid Prescription History and Opioid Misuse

Perceptions.” American Journal of Health Behavior, vol. 43, no. 2, Mar. 2019, pp. 361

–372. EBSCOhost, doi:10.5993/AJHB.43.2.12. Accessed 24 Mar. 2020.

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