Pennsylvania Drug Statistics Drug Abuse as a Plague

In the state of Pennsylvania, there is a plague that is sweeping through the communities, homes, schools and business places. This plague terrorizes families, friends, neighborhoods and leaves devastation, sickness and death behind. The plague is that of the presence of drugs. Just like any other plague that has swept our nation over the years, the battle on drug abuse will not back down easily. It will take many joint efforts in order to make any kind of difference or impact on the Pennsylvania drug statistics.

The primary source of drugs comes from the Hispanic drug traffickers that utilize Pennsylvanias complex transportation infrastructure. Colombian and Dominican drug traffickers bring large shipments of wholesale quantity drugs such as heroin and cocaine into the state and then sell them to smaller, local drug dealers. Mexican drug traffickers are slowly starting to make an appearance in the state of Pennsylvania as well. Besides the transport and wholesale distribution, the Colombian and Dominican drug cartels are also responsible for retail drug sales on a street level in many of the cities throughout the state. Local criminal groups like the African American and Caucasian are also responsible for much of the street level sales of drugs such as cocaine, heroin, marijuana and meth. These criminal groups are in fact the direct link between the drugs and the drug abusers which is adding to the rates of drug abuse in Pennsylvania. It is a non-stop plague that does not seem to be going away.

Pennsylvania drug statistics report an obvious problem with drug abuse in the state. During 1999, a survey taken reported that: 36.4% of all residents over the age of 12 had used drugs on at least one occasion, 10.6% had used within 12 months and 7% had used within 30 days. These numbers were greater than those reported on a national level. Furthermore, drug treatment admissions in Pennsylvania showed a 4% increase when it jumped from 63,231 during 1999 to 65,791 during 2000. These numbers are equal to 484 drug treatment admissions for every 100,000 people who reside in Pennsylvania.

One very scary thing about drug abuse is that people die when they use drugs. The majority of the time, the drug related death is an accident. Pennsylvania drug statistics report from the emergency departments in the state that during the year 1999, there were 45,685 cases that were related to drugs. Of these numbers, 810 of them were deaths directly linked to drugs.

The drugs available in the state of Pennsylvania include marijuana, heroin and meth among many. Marijuana is the most used drug throughout the state and has some very high use statistics. Heroin continues to be a problem as it is very obtainable and used in fairly high amounts. Meth is available in the state but use is low. One major area of concern in the state is that of heroin abuse.

Pennsylvania has long been known for the heroin statistics related to the Philadelphia area. In fact, the city of Philadelphia is the biggest area for heroin sales and transport in the whole state of Pennsylvania. In an open market place known as the badlands, retailers of heroin stand watch for the next customer to approach. The badlands are so big for heroin distribution in fact that there is a special task force operations program especially designed for this area. Although law enforcement has managed to arrest and convict thousands of people selling heroin in this area, it hasnt done much to put a damper on the sales there.

Heroin is a very dangerous drug that has many negative consequences associated with its use. It is highly addictive and leaves nothing but destruction in its path. Although there is typically not a lot of violence related to the use of heroin, there is a lot of death. Sometimes all it takes is trying heroin one time to overdose on it. The reason that heroin is easily overdosed on is because the drug is typically injected through a needle and often times people take too much because they are either unfamiliar with dosage or they are trying to get a stronger high. Additionally, sometimes people get a hold of bad heroin that contains extra additives in it that are deadly when put in the bloodstream. Heroin is not only associated with overdose deaths though. Heroin is also responsible for many deaths caused by the infection of the HIV/AIDS virus due to the sharing of drug needles by someone who is infected with the virus. In fact, heroin needle sharing is where a large portion of the residents in the country obtain the HIV/AIDS virus. Despite efforts to prevent the spread of this infection by promoting no needle sharing, the number of people infected each year due to sharing of needles has not seen a decrease.

People who are trying to quit the use of heroin will likely have physically withdraw symptoms because this drug is physically addictive as it is mentally. Often times, it is difficult for someone to quit heroin cold turkey and they need the help of a drug treatment center to be successful.

Drug treatment centers in Pennsylvania offer treatment programs for any type of drug or person. For heroin, they can give a medication to the abuser so that the effects of the withdraws are not so bad. The medicine most often used is called methadone and there are many methadone clinics located throughout the state. The first step to getting off drugs though, is to first admit that there is an addiction. You may not understand your addiction but there are people in the drug treatment centers that do and they want to help you.

If you have an addiction to a drug or know someone who does, it is very important for you to seek help immediately. The sooner you are able to get help, the better chance you will have to recover successfully from the use of the drug so that you can live a happier, fuller life absent from the plague of drugs.