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Under
the Rug
By Mohammed
Zain
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The
sale of sedative drugs without the doctor’s
prescription is
causing physical and mental problems to the people,
particularly students.
“Many students are addicted to sedative
drugs. As many people suffer from insomnia or
sleeplessness, they resort to the use of sedative
drugs which are freely available at medical stores,”
says a psychiatrist at Teaching Hospital. He
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says that
people generally start with tablets, and within
a few months, when these become less affective,
they switch over to injections. Several brand names
of a very popular sleeping pill ‘Lorazepam’
are available at medical stores. The chemists are
least bothered who the buyer is. But the psychiatrists
say that sedatives and tranquillizers must only
be sold to those who produce a doctor’s prescription
for a particular drug.
Another psychologist says that many students pick
up the habit of taking sedatives when they study
late into the night. As most departments hold examinations
on yearly basis, the students do not concentrate
on their studies throughout the year. Hence they
prepare for their exams under immense pressure unable
to sleep at night.
This condition of theirs compels them to take drugs.
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Not only the students, a number of heroin
addicts also use sedative drugs, as heroin is costly and
difficult to acquire.
“Then there are the educated ones who were previously
hooked onto liquor and have now taken to sedatives and
tranquillizers as drinking was socially unacceptable,”
says a pharmacist. He says Pakistan is a Rs. 40 billions
drugs market, of which sedatives and tranquillizers are
50 per cent.
It is now a fact that the use of these drugs affects the
central nervous system of the young users; they became
short-tempered. However, older people |
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are less vulnerable.
The users of sleep-inducing pills feel composed and relaxed
because all these preparations are opiates, adding its
continuous use could cause placidity and rigidity. With
the passage of time and growing sense of survival, in
the fast moving times, majority of the “rat-race
participant” are likely to get hooked up with sedatives,
to find temporary or false refuge from hectic survival
efforts. It is but natural for people to find the easy
way out to their problems. And the easiest way to ignore
problem, no matter how big, is to forget it by getting
“brains deal effect” through heavy sedatives.
It is putting an issue under rug, rather than solving
it. For this option, not much efforts are needed, except
walking up to any street corner, and buying any sedative
drug from the shop. No questions asked.
It is imperative that such practice be curbed, if the
future generation has to come out healthy and progressive.
While the drug stores MUST not sell any sedative to any
one without prescription from doctor, particularly the
youth, the government should also take an immediate action
to frame a law, preventing “on counter” sale
of such drugs. |
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Boning
Up
It
was big news 16 months ago when drug-makers announced
that the powerful
osteoporosis medicine Fosamax could be taken once a
week instead of once a day.
Once a year is even better, and early reports suggest
that yearly, five-minute IV infusion of a relative of
Fosamax, called zometa, may increase bone density of
the spine by 5% and of
the hip by 3%. So far Zometa doesn’t seem to have
the side effects of Fosamax, which
include abdominal pain and nausea. However, 10% of patients
may experience
flu-like symptoms for a couple of hours after treatment.
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