From an August 25, 2010 New York Times article, quoting information from the 2009 report on drug use by state, put out by the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration of Department of Health and Human Services, estimated that 8.1% of the U. S. Population, age 12 and above, had used an illicit drug in the last month. Assuming that the U. S. population above the age of 12 is around 83%, that would be over 20,000,000 people that have used an illicit drug in the last month. That’s 20,000,000 people mind you!

Some relevant statistical estimates:

• 305,529,237: U.S. population estimate for Jan. 1, 2009

• 2,743,429: Population added since Jan. 1, 2008

• 8: Estimated number of seconds between births in January 2009

• 12: Estimated number of seconds between deaths in January 2009

• 1: Estimated number of immigrants added to the population every 36 seconds in January 2009 (very telling)

Estimates for the street value of just one illegal drug, cocaine, is around $25 to $100 per gram, depending on location. There are 28.35 grams to an ounce, so the street value of an ounce of cocaine, based on the street value of a gram, is between $708 to $2,835. Let’s just say that all 20,000,000 illicit drug users used cocaine as their drug of choice and that each drug user uses one ounce of cocaine a month. Thus, the annual street value of our estimated 20,000,000 average cocaine users, can vary between almost $19 billion to over $68 billion. Our roughly calculated estimates agree with one source we found that stated that” “the estimated U.S. cocaine market exceeded $70 billion in street value for the year 2005.” $70 billion is a lot of money and some people will kidnap, torture, kill, maim or even behead for just a small fraction of that chance to riches.

Now of course there are many illegal drugs and many prescription drugs that these estimated 20,000,000 American drug users use. Here are some other estimates of the illegal drug trade: “In 2000, Americans spent about $36 billion on cocaine, $10 billion on heroin, $5.4 billion on methamphetamine, $11 billion on marijuana, and $2.4 billion on other substances.” Source: Abt Associates, “What America’s Users Spend on Illegal Drugs 1988-2000″ (Washington, DC: Office of National Drug Control, December 2001), p. 2.

Cocaine use in the United States (source: American Council for Drug Education)
Cocaine was first isolated from the coca leaf in the late 1800s. It quickly became popular as an ingredient in patent medicines (throat lozenges, tonics, etc.) and other products (e.g., Coca Cola, from which it was later removed). Concern soon mounted due to instances of addiction, psychotic behavior, convulsion, and death. A series of steps, including passage of the Pure Food and Drug Act of 1906, were taken to combat health and behavioral problems associated with the use of cocaine and other drugs. Finally, the Harrison Act of 1914 was enacted, outlawing the use of cocaine and opiates in over-the-counter products and making these drugs available only by prescription. Cocaine use soon dropped dramatically and remained at minimal levels for nearly half a century. It continued to be used as a local anesthetic in eye, nose, and throat surgery, however, and still is used today.

In the 1960s, illicit cocaine use rebounded. Although cocaine powder was expensive, selling at about $100 per gram, use of the drug had become common among middle and upper middle-class Americans by the late 1970s. A kind of generational forgetting had occurred. Lost were the lessons about cocaine’s toxicity and the dangers of abuse that had been learned from the cocaine epidemic earlier in the century. By the mid-1980s, there was widespread evidence of physiological and psychological problems among cocaine users, with increased emergency-room episodes and admissions to treatment.

A broad range of consequences include: (same source)

• Dependence and addiction

• Cardiovascular problems, including irregular heartbeat, heart attack, and heart failure

• Neurological incidents, including strokes, seizures, fungal brain infections, and hemorrhaging in tissue surrounding the brain

• Pulmonary effects, such as fluid in the lungs, aggravation of asthma and other lung disorders, and respiratory failure

• Psychiatric complications, including psychosis, paranoia, depression, anxiety disorders, and delusions

• Increased risk of traumatic injury from accidents and aggressive, violent, or criminal behavior.

• Other effects include: sleeplessness, sexual dysfunction, diminished sense of smell, perforated nasal septum, nausea, and headaches.

• Crack users often singe eyebrows or eyelashes with the flame of matches or lighters. They also burn fingertips and other body parts from contact with superheated vessels (e.g., glass pipes).

• Fetal cocaine effects include premature separation of the placenta, spontaneous abortion, premature labor, low birthweight and head circumference at birth, greater chance of visual impairment, mental retardation, genitourinary malformations, and greater chance of developmental problems.

• For intravenous (IV) cocaine users, there is increased risk of hepatitis, HIV infection, and endocarditis.

• For addicts, whether they smoke, inject, or snort, promiscuous sexual activity can increase the risk of HIV infection.

What we have presented above are just estimates of the direct cost of the buying illegal drugs and do not take into account the health costs of overdosing, deaths, crime, loss of production and the toll it takes on young inner-city users who are led into a life of crime to fund their illegal drug habit. Nor does it take into account the emotional damage it does to the users and those who surround the users. And further, it does not take into account what these drugs and the huge sums of money surrounding the drug trade, inflict on the innocent who just happen to get in the way of the violence dished out by the suppliers of the drugs, as they fight over turf and market share.

But there is one other consequence of drug use of any kind. The loss of morals and the loss of honor, integrity and honesty. Without morals and without honor, no free country can survive. As illegal drug use rises, these positive human characteristics fade out of existence, or become irrelevant. If drug use becomes on a grand scale, America is surely doomed.

There are a few well known economic truisms wrapped up in what are called the laws of supply and demand. If there is no demand, there is no need for a supply. If the demand is greater than the supply, the price of the product is high. If the demand is less than the supply, the price of the product is low. A constant balancing act goes on to keep the supply slightly less than the demand, to maintain stability in the price. However, in the world of illegal drug use, the supply is purposely kept well lower than the demand in order to maintain premium prices. Also, the fact that the drugs are illegal, adds to the price. It should be readily apparent that if you dry up the demand, you dry up the need for the supply and you eliminate the violence.

So who is to blame for the violence on and south of our southern border and the crime in our inner cities? Is it the government who can’t control it? Is it the border patrol agents who are overwhelmed by the task with which they are charged? Is it the police in our large cities? Is it the drug growers and the cartels that supply the drugs and dish out their brutal violence? Hardly! It is those among us with no self discipline, self respect and no morals that fuel the drug lords and thus it is those among us that are complicit in the violence, on either side of the border. In fact, it is those drug users and pushers among us that contribute to the almost immeasurable cost of doing drugs ….. by doing drugs. In the end, it is those among us who tempt the devil and allow him into their hearts, their minds, their homes and their communities and infect their children. It is those same among us who will be responsible for the downfall of our nation and the elimination of our freedom.

Ask yourself. Are you contributing to the violence on our southern border and the destruction of our freedom by doing drugs? If you are, then you are doing more damage to America than the aftermath of the 9/11 terrorist attack on the Twin Towers and the Pentagon.

© Copyright August 26, 2010 – All Rights Reserved

~ The Author ~
Ron Ewart is the President of The National Association of Rural Landowners and nationally recognized author on freedom and property rights issues. Ron may reached for comment via email at r.ewart@comcast.net.