Drug abuse or substance abuse has brought so many tragedies. It is now known as the cancer of the community causing terrible pain, grief and loss among users and their families and friends. There may be different types of drug abuse and abuse on prescription drugs is among them.
Prescription drug abuse is simply defined as the intake of prescription drugs that are not prescribed to you or overdosing on these drugs. This has the easiest access to drug abuse or substance abuse, aside from the fact that these can be purchased from pharmacies with a prescription, you can also get these drugs from people in your family that are prescribed with these medicines.
Medicines are created to heal people with their sickness and to provide relief from physical pain. These medicines also have their own side effects, and when consumed or taken in a higher than the normal dosage it can cause you pain, illness and suffering. Drug dependency can slow down or alter the human brain’s functions. If these medicines are taken with other medicines or alcohol it can cause paranoia, anxiety, seizures and a lot more. In the long term, abusing these medicines can cause harm rather than healing.
We are all aware of the devastating effects of drug abuse in our community, but nobody knows it better than the families of those who suffer dependency on prescription drugs. Substance abuse has claimed the lives of millions of people worldwide which have left families broken and damaged.
This is the sad story in Rockcastle County, Kentucky, a quiet hillside county that exudes a simple life. A horrible nightmare is turning into reality, everyday an average of one life has been taken away due to abuse of prescription drugs. The worst part, this is the life of a parent to innocent children which has left this small county with thousands of orphaned children. They are either living with non-families or raised by non-parents and growing up with no parent to guide them in their life.
The death toll of people dying from an overdose of medicine in this county rises every year, and it is almost normal in any school to hear that a child’s parent has succumbed to this darkness. This unusual event in this county is now a seemingly normal life for them. But, how can you call it normal for kids to grow up in different houses, sleeping in different couches and never having a mother or a father to guide them in their life?
Prescription drug abuse is not just prominent in Rockcastle County, worldwide there are millions of cases of drug overdose that leads to death and broken families. Their family, especially the kids do not need to suffer the loss of a loved one. Help can be given to prescription drug dependents.
There are already various organizations worldwide that aim to prevent the increase of people depending on prescription drugs. They help spread awareness on prescription drug dependency, how to prevent it and how to get out of it. These organizations also help the families and orphaned children of the deceased dependents get a chance to still live a normal life.
Addiction to prescription drugs does not just leave the users with a wrecked life, but it also affects their kids and families. The situation in Rockcastle County is a living sample; it was the kids who paid the price of their parents’ addiction to prescription medicines.
Losing your parent or parents to sickness or accident is easier to accept and live with. But losing them due to their addiction to prescription drugs, which can be prevented and provided with help and support, is a nightmare that these little souls has to take and bear for a long time.
This video update by Sanjay Gupta from CNN tells the sad story of these children.
