Is drug abuse a disease?
97023
No, it is just the lunacy of weak willed/minded people!\n\nPeople in todays society use the word "desease" to avoid admitting their own fault/s.
975940
Actually, yes I do. I took a class on drugs and drug dependency years ago, and I was really stunned at how many problems are caused by alcohol, yet it's legal. It can't be just a health issue, or cigarettes would be illegal, too. It's all politics.....
41141
No.\nLay off the drugs. They are bad for you.
296830
It's called drug-use, Honey...and you should really get help. :(
730237
drugs are bad for you..  get help now!
100755
no, more disease, drugs, troubled kids.
659492
It is true, she lost her husband ( a cop who had no idea about her meth use) and she nearly lost her life.  People feel sorry for her because she is fighting the addiction and because she has publically admitted the addictin.  Addiction is a disease remember, and everyone of us has it in some form or another be it drugs, cigarettes, sex, money, coffee, food, or barbie dolls.  Compassion is all that seperates us from the wild animals of the world so please exercise it.
893614
I would say it depends on your gender and culture.  In the white, American culture, if you are a woman, it is more stigmatized to be dependent on alcohol... however if you are male it is more socially accepted (I believe this also goes for the Mexican culture).  IF you are African American or part of that culture, then being addicted to drugs would potentially be a less stigmatized position.  All depends... and also depends on what drug.  Cannabis compared to crack/cocaine or meth have different connotations.
388853
maybe a meth addiction ?
248543
An addiction is a disease.  Obsession is a preferance, a want but not something your mind and body believes it can't live without and actually physically pains you not to have.
1184502
According to Webster, an illness is an unhealthy condition of body or mind while a disease is a condition of the living animal or plant body or of one of its parts that impairs normal functioning.
470982
depression is a mental disease, so no. if you have diabetes or cancer is it a sin? it is time for society to see depression as a real disease and not something people just decide to have.
777655
Scroll down to "Chronic"\nhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cocaine\n\nHere is another view from www.erowid.org\nLONG-TERM USE:\nHeavy, regular use of cocaine is known to cause restlessness, anxiety, hyperexcitability, paranoia, irritability, insomnia, weight loss, and a variety of other less acute psychological symptoms. Insufflation of any substance can lead to damaging the cartiledge and mucosa in the nose, eventually leading to a hole in the septum (the soft structure separating the nostils). If injected, cocaine use can lead to a wide variety of problems including life-threatening infections, shared needle-related blood diseases, etc.\nhttp://www.erowid.org/chemicals/cocaine/cocaine.shtml\n\nCheck out both sites,\n\nMikeC
408725
They specialize in substance abuse.
185793
This question needs to be more defined. Every drug affects every person differently. They are used for recreation, they are used to cure, they are used to help in life. There are effects would be way to numerous to try to list here.
1142956
Ingesting any substance commonly known as a drug or alcohol. Ingesting can occur by drinking, sniffing, snorting, using skin patches, etc.  vs. abuse which is overuse or using to impair your normal mood or functional state.
676856
Drug use is merely any taking of substances to modify perceptions.\n\nDrug abuse is when drug use gets to the level that it interfers with normal activity or becomes a primary motivator for actions.\n\nDrug dependency is when the use of a drug becomes extensive enough that to maintain physical status (sometimes mental is included) that drug is required.