Bulletin on narcotics最新文献

Women are linked to illicit drug-related activities, whether they be cultivation, production, trafficking, peddling or consumption. The real extent of the impact of these activities on women, however, has only gradually been gaining the attention of policy makers dealing with matters related to drug abuse and illicit trafficking. This increase in awareness is the result of successful collaboration between organizations of the United Nations system in conducting gender analysis and research into the relationship between drug abuse and related activities and women. The present article documents the process of that collaboration, which led to the recognition of the issue at the Fourth World Conference on Women: Action for Equality, Development and Peace, held at Beijing from 4 to 15 September 1995. Since the World Conference, a United Nations System-Wide Plan of Action was developed in 1996 on "Women and Drug Abuse: a Gender Perspective".

The aim of the Idolé Foundation which was established in June 1993, is to help women discharged from prison. To achieve that aim, it has opened a centre where women are provided with free accommodation and training of various kinds, including sewing, dyeing, embroidery, soap-making, cooking and sex education. It has been observed that 30 per cent of these former prisoners were drug dependent and another 30 per cent had had contact with drugs without becoming dependent. These women continue to consume drugs while in prison, where they resort to a number of strategies to satisfy their craving and, on release, their addiction forces them into violent milieux, where they are subjected to sexual slavery. Forced to share their earnings with procurers, they are obliged, in order to continue their drug habit, to change partners and submit to increasingly depraved demands, including the introduction of sometimes very dangerous substances into their genital organs.

The purpose of this article is to highlight the complex interrelationship between the family and psychoactive substance dependence and the important role of the family in the prevention, treatment, rehabilitation and social reintegration of substance-dependent persons. In addition, illustrations of the influence of the family on substance dependence and the effect of substance-dependent members on the family are analysed on the basis of data from countries in Africa, the Americas, Asia and Europe.

Thailand is undergoing ever-accelerating socio-economic transformation which exercises tremendous strains on its basic social institution, the Thai family. The family has traditionally exercised firm control over its members, thus ensuring cohesion and conformity to social norms. Progressive destabilization and disorientation of urban society resulting in a weakening of its foundations and gradual erosion of core functions has led to a deterioration of the family's role and importance. The deterioration of the role of the family is even more critical in the Thai context because, traditionally, the Thai family provided the strongest and most dependable bulwark against social evils of any kind, not the least of which has become drug abuse. The grave state of the country's drug (heroin) abuse problems has recently been further aggravated with the emergent HIV/AIDS epidemic. That epidemic has affected substantial portions of intravenous heroin drug users, posing threats for families all over the country. Evidently, affected families have not been able to protect vulnerable members from becoming drug users; worse still, families have frequently contributed to creating or compounding the problem. Measures need be taken to effectively check this detrimental trend and avert further erosion. The Thai family needs reorientation, parenting and family skills. That would help reinforce the role of the family in preventing drug abuse as well as in rehabilitating former users. To back up the Thai family, still other social groups need to be recruited which can assume some of its stabilizing functions.

Drug-producing countries such as the Andean countries of South America where cocaine is manufactured are confronted by special difficulties associated with the widespread availability of drugs. There have been few detailed reports of patterns of use in relation to the type and severity of cocaine dependence problems within those countries. The present study looks at the patterns of cocaine use in relation to severity of dependence among a clinical sample of South American cocaine users. Information about patterns of cocaine use and severity of dependence was collected from a sample of 68 drug users who were receiving treatment for cocaine problems at treatment centres in Bolivia and Peru. Levels of cocaine consumption were extremely high. The mean daily dose was 16.4 grams. The majority of the users (87 per cent) smoked cocaine in the form of pasta, pitillo or basuco. More than half of the sample reported using cocaine at least 20 times a day. Severity-of-dependence scale scores were high and these are consistent with the frequent and compulsive pattern of use reported within the sample. It is suggested that the more severe cocaine problems reported in South America compared to some western countries may be due to the substantial differences in the amounts of cocaine which are typically ingested. In the Bolivian sample most of the users were taking cocaine in amounts which greatly exceed those usually seen in western countries.

One hundred male ex-addicts who were provided with an indigenized group counselling programme in after-care service during their two-year compulsory supervision were administered two psychological tests at the beginning and the end of the programme. The tests were eight rating scales on attitudinal and psychological characteristics and the 16 PF questionnaire. t tests show that the successes have changed their attitude towards drug-taking from "favourable" to "unfavourable", and that they have improved in their psychological state and functioning.

Transnational criminal organizations, particularly drug-trafficking organizations, operate unrestricted across international borders. They are very similar in kind to legitimate transnational corporations in structure, strength, size, geographical range and scope of their operations. Above all other features they engage in unregulated forms of capitalist enterprise. To fully understand transnational criminal organizations it is necessary to examine them as organizations responding to economic opportunities and focus on the factors that influence their emergence. Those factors can be understood as a result of the confluence of opportunities, pressures, incentives and resources at the global and national level. The present article identifies the key environmental factors relevant to the emergence of transnational criminal organizations, and explores the intrinsic relationship between those organizations, their home States and host States. It is those conditions which not only give rise to transnational criminal organizations, but also help to sustain them.

The family in the United Republic of Tanzania has traditionally been a paramount institution invested with important functions of socialization. It provided spiritual guidance, emotional and social support systems, security and education, and defined the moral and ethical system in which the community was intricately bound together. The institution is weakening under the impact of modernization at a pace that far exceeds the pace at which newer institutions are emerging to assume those responsibilities. Drug abuse is becoming an unwelcome guest under those circumstances. It is proposed that active measures should be taken at the community and national policy level to strengthen and employ the family for the purpose of promoting a drug-free lifestyle.

The authors recently completed a set of monographs on culture and drug use and abuse in a tribal district in Gujarat in western India where changes have occurred in alcohol consumption, two districts in Karnataka in south India where widespread use of cannabis is prevalent, six districts of Gujarat where extensive opium drinking is common, and also on the drug abuse situation in Goa, Delhi and Bombay. On the basis of those studies, the authors call for decentralized planning and a review of the Single Convention on Narcotic Drugs of 1961, and they critique some of the dominant practices in contemporary prevention and rehabilitation of addicts. The role of the family is examined as a socialization institution for transmittal of culture. The limits posed by patriarchy on the extent to which the family can be an agent of primary or secondary prevention of drug use and abuse are indicated.

Volatile substance abuse (VSA) (glue sniffing, inhalant abuse, solvent abuse), the deliberate inhalation of volatile substances in order to achieve intoxication, has now been reported from most parts of the world, mainly among adolescents, individuals living in remote communities and those whose occupations give ready access to abusable substances. Solvents from contact adhesives, notably toluene, petrol (gasoline), halogenated solvents, volatile hydrocarbons such as those found in cigarette lighter refills, aerosol propellants, halocarbon fire extinguishers, and inhalational anaesthetics may be abused in this way. VSA gives rise to dose-related effects similar to those of other hypnosedatives. Small doses can rapidly lead to euphoria and other disturbances of behaviour similar to those caused by ethanol (alcohol), and may also induce delusions and hallucinations. Higher doses may produce life-threatening effects such as convulsions and coma. Death may ensue indirectly after, for example, inhalation of vomit, or from direct cardiac or central nervous system toxicity. Chronic abuse of toluene-containing products and of chlorinated solvents such as 1,1,1-trichloroethane, for example, can produce severe organ damage, especially in the liver, kidneys, and brain. Drunken behaviour, unexplained listlessness, anorexia and moodiness may result from VSA, especially in children and adolescents. The hair, breath and clothing may smell of solvent, and empty adhesive tubes or other containers, potato crisp bags, cigarette lighter refills, and aerosol spray cans are often found. Toxicological examination of blood and tissue specimens is especially important in confirming a diagnosis of sudden VSA-related death. The development and evaluation of strategies for the treatment of chronic abusers and for prevention are major challenges for the future.