Over the course of the semester, Life, Society, and Drugs has introduced me to global concepts pertaining to drug use, both legal and illegal, of which I was blissfully unaware. Addiction and substance abuse looms in the United States as we attempt to battle our failures at regulating prescription drug use. “Big Pharma” was real all along, quietly bribing doctors while they industrialized the health of the American population for profit. The negative aspects and portrayal of substance abuse and dependency that we are exposed to in our society are only the tip of the iceberg. In regions of instability and poverty, drug trafficking and trade is an enormous source of power and political influence. 

The origins of the opioid crisis was brought to light last year when Purdue Pharma pleaded guilty to fueling the opioid crisis in the United States after their rollout of the prescription painkiller, Oxycontin, and revolutionized prescription drug marketing. Purdue used similar tactics to, well… drug cartels. As we learn more about how drug cartels influenced politics with bribery and loyalty, we begin to notice a similar pattern in the tactics used by Purdue and other pharmaceutical companies. Lobbying and lining the pockets of political figures has been one of many of Purdue’s successful marketing techniques to put highly addictive substances in the hands of everyday, average Americans. What was intended to be a drug marketed at terminally ill cancer patients, slowly began to evolve into a dangerous scheme to market highly addictive drugs to Americans who didn’t need them. The key success of Purdue was their blatant misrepresentation of how addictive Oxycontin actually was, marketing the pill as virtually non-habit forming. This lie led to an increase in prescriptions written by doctors across the United States. As addiction rates and addition related injury and death began to soar, the company continued to lobby against restrictions against the medication; and instead lobbied for less restrictions and more liberal policy regarding prescription painkiller distribution. The Sackler Family, of Purdue Pharma, capitalized on profiting from addicts and perpetuating the problem for two decades. This not only caused devastating effects domestically, but also worldwide.

For years I had thought that the instability in the Middle East was the result of unjust oil hikes. Oil definitely plays a large role in the regional instability, but I had absolutely no idea that a huge contributor to the rise of terrorist and extremist groups was profitable opioid production. The region has been shattered by both illegal and legal opium cultivation, trade, and trafficking. Opium has funded extremists and terrorists not just in recent years, but for centuries. Opium cultivation has plagued countries and territories all over the world, including world leaders like the United States and China. The opioid crisis we currently see within our borders is tragic, no doubt, but the second you start to understand the links between our overconsumption and overprescription of opioids and destruction of the regions that are cultivating opium, we see that this a “tip of the iceberg” situation. We are seeing addiction and death rates sky rocket, as the Middle East struggles with extremists rising to power through both legal and black market trade and cultivation. Violence and destruction of an entire region, multiple times over multiple centuries can be linked to opium. 

I had never given much thought into the source of where the highly addictive compounds had come from and how the U.S. acquisition and demand for these compounds could influence other regions throughout the world. It was incredibly naive of me, I must admit, to think that these compounds and ingredients were either just lab grown or self manifested themselves magically within a laboratory. I already had the awareness of the corruption of the pharmaceutical industry and the health care system in regards to perpetuating substance abuse and addiction. It was naive of me to believe that the ingredients to make these highly addictive drugs would have not also had to have caused some sort of global scale destruction. If a manufacturer has the moral compass to addict their own population to deadly and devastating substances, what would make them care about the sustainability and global impact of where their ingredients were sourced? 

As someone who tries to stay active and involved with global health, I’m honestly a little disappointed with how thick my own veil was. I am very grateful to have been able to take this class this semester. In the future, what I have learned from this class is to not take nationwide problems for face value. There is likely going to be some deeper rooted problem that involves the global population and global health. The reach of human capacity for evil and selfish gain does not stop at the U.S. border, which means that the reach of human capacity to understand and advocate for global health and wellbeing can’t either.