Risks of Drug Addiction and Techniques of Tackling them
Like many other countries, in Bangladesh, the number of drug-addicted people
is increasing gradually. Significant portions of the drug-addicted are
teenagers and adolescents. Again, many of the street urchins, working
children, and people of various occupations such as laborers, business
persons, rickshaw pullers, bus-truck drivers, other professionals, and sex
workers are also drug-addicted.
One of the many causes of the spread of drug addiction includes frustration,
unemployment, family unhappiness, curiosity, and the influence of bad friends,
etc.
Risks of Drug Addiction
There are various influences from different corners on teenagers to take
drugs. The friends or classmates who are already addicted to drugs may
influence the teenagers by proposing to take drugs.
Besides, the drug peddlers or sellers of drugs may also instigate children to
try their items in many ways. Thus, teenagers find themselves in a very risky
situation. Disaster occurs if anyone surrenders to the bad proposals of
friends and starts taking drugs with them.
On the contrary, refusing the proposals of friends and start taking drugs may
cause coldness in friendship. Again, the rejection of proposals by people
other than friends may also create a situation where there are risks of being
harmed by them. We should always be careful so that such a risky situation
does not take place.
Tackling risky situations
We should observe the behavior, power, and influence of the people who provoke
us to take drugs. Considering all these aspects we should reject their
proposals to take drugs so that there does not take place any risky situations
to get harmed.
We should keep ourselves very cool at the time of rejecting their proposals.
If we cannot say ‘no’ directly, then we should leave the place tactfully in
order to avoid risks. If the influencing person is a friend or relative, we
should handle the situation carefully so that friendship or relationship does
not deteriorate.
When the situation is not that much risky, we should not only simply refuse
certain viruses that can gradually weaken our immune system and ultimately
destroy it completely. Such a virus is known as HIV.
What is HIV-AIDS? HIV and AIDS are two abbreviations. The full forms of these
words are Human Immunodeficiency Virus (HIV) and Acquired Immune Deficiency
Syndrome (AIDS). HIV is a special type of virus that can enter the human body
in a number of ways.
HIV damages white blood cells and thus destroys the immune system of the body.
When the virus enters the human body, the patient frequently suffers from
various other diseases such as diarrhea, tuberculosis, pneumonia, etc., and no
treatment and medicine work to cure them.
Such a health condition of an HIV-contaminated individual is called AIDS. If
HIV enters any human body, its symptoms are not visible immediately.
Generally, it takes time from 6 months up to a few years to be exposed as AIDS
symptoms start from the day HIV enters the body.
In some cases, it takes 5-10 years or more to detect AIDS from the date of HIV
contamination. This time is called the talent period. During this period HIV
can spread to other’s bodies from the people who have already acquired HIV.
Symptoms of AIDS: AIDS does not have any specific symptoms. But when an
AIDS patient is attacked by other diseases, the symptoms of those diseases are
visible in the patient. Even there are some common symptoms of AIDS. They are
–
1) Cough prolonging more than a month at a stretch,
2) Skin disease all over the body,
3) A kind of ulcer in the face and throat,
4) Swelling of lymph glands,
5) Decrease of memory and intelligence, etc.
Main symptoms of AIDS
1) Quick loss of body weight.
2) Loose motion for more than a month.
3) Frequently fever or over sweating at night.
4) Excessive tiredness or fatigue.
5) Dry cough etc.
We should remember that if any or more symptoms from the above list are
visible in any individual, we cannot call them an AIDS patient for sure. HIV
can be detected from blood reports under the supervision of an experienced
doctor.
Spread of HIV-AIDS
HIV is a silent killer. In order to take cautionary measures against this
fatal disease, we need to know how HIV and AIDS are communicated from one
person to another. HIV is not transmitted through air, water, food or general
physical contact, etc. Basically, HIV lives in various body fluids such as
blood, semen, vaginal serum, breast milk, etc. When the blood or semen or
vaginal serum of an AIDS patient enters the body of another person or when a
child sucks the breast of the mother, they are contaminated by the HIV virus.
Basically, HIV spreads in the following ways –
1) Illicit and unsafe sexual intercourse. The most common cause of spreading
HIV-AIDS is unsafe sexual relationships. According to statistics, it is found
that 80% of HIV-AIDS-affected people have acquired this virus as a result of
the unsafe sexual serum of the affected people.
2) Taking blood of affected people: HIV-AIDS can be communicated
through limb transplantation and needle and syringe already used by AIDS
patients. Drug-addicted people frequently use the same needles and syringes to
take drugs by many people together. Healthy people will be contaminated by
using needles syringes used by an HIV-AIDS-affected person.
3) From mother or children: The activities for which HIV-AIDS does not
spread are mentioned below –
1) During the antenatal period
2) During delivery of children
3) During giving breast milk to children
The activities for which HIV-AIDS does not spread are mentioned below –
1) Through sneeze, cough, spit, or breathing
2) Living in the same house or eating together from the same plate, etc.
3) Playing together and studying in the same class.
4) Shaking hands, embracing, or using clothes.
5) Through mosquitoes or other, insects.
6) Nursing the affected people and
7) Using the same bathrooms or toilets.
We must know all these are preventive measures in order to save ourselves and
our society from a deadly like HIV-AIDS.
