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June 22, 2011

Effects of Alcohol Addiction on Community

Filed under: Substance Abuse — Tags: — Winson @ 9:49 AM

Alcohol addiction has many negative effects on the community, which includes violent acts, numerous deaths and injuries from alcohol related accidents and so on. Following are the some of the effects of the alcohol addiction on the community:

Costs:
According to the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, alcohol is responsible for 26 percent of the accidents caused in the United States. In 2000, alcohol related accidents cost the public about $114.3 billion. Alcohol related accidents accounted for about 18 percent of the auto insurance payments.

Crime:
Persons who abuse alcohol often are associated with drunken driving and other crimes. In the United States, drunken driving is the reason for 13,000 deaths and thousands of injuries each year. 1.4 million people are arrested each year in US because of drunken driving. The persons abusing alcohol not only involves in the offenses related to drunken driving but they may also involve in crimes such as assault and domestic violence.

Underage Drinking:
According to the National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism, nearly 50 percent of adolescents have had at least one drink by the time they reach their eighth grade. The rate of drunken driving in the teens aged between 16 and 20 years, is two times more than the rate of drunken driving by the individuals aged 21 and older. Alcohol abusing can also induce depression and suicidal tendencies, unwanted pregnancy and sexually transmitted diseases in the teens.

The above are the various effects of alcohol addiction on the community.

June 21, 2011

Social and Economic Costs of the Alcohol Addiction

Filed under: Substance Abuse,Substance Abuse — Tags: — Winson @ 9:48 AM

If an individual is addicted to alcohol, there develops a compulsive need for alcohol in that individual. Generally alcohol is an intoxicating liquid and it is obtained from fermented grain or fruit. A person who is addicted to the alcohol experiences withdrawal symptoms like nausea, sweating, shakiness, or anxiety when alcohol consumption is stopped. Excess consumption of the alcohol imposes heavy costs on, both economy and the society.

  • Various estimates reports that the alcohol related problems cost American society and the U.S. economy billions of dollars each year.
  • According to an estimate by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, alcohol addiction costed an estimated amount of $184.6 billion in 1998 to the U.S. economy. Researchers also found that the cost of alcoholism increased between 3 percent to 4 percent each year.
  • The Marin Institute, an alcohol industry watchdog organization, estimated that the problems related to alcohol addiction costs American society more than $175 billion a year.
  • The same research also reported that the alcohol is abused largely by the teens who are between 12 to 17 years. Researchers also noted that alcohol addiction is the reason for the cause of thousands of deaths each year.
  • The different types of the costs caused by the alcohol addiction to the economy and the society include, medical costs, lost earnings related to alcohol related illnesses, lost earnings resulting from premature deaths and various costs arising from alcohol related traffic accidents and costs associated with criminal justice and litigation.
  • The World Health Organization, in a report, in the year 2004, on the global impact of alcohol use, concluded that the alcohol addiction causes serious health problems like cancers, cirrhosis of the liver, cardiovascular disease and severe brain diseases.
  • Along with these economic costs, alcohol addiction also causes social problems like damaging the family relationships, drunken driving and other criminal offenses.

The above are the various social and economic problems caused due to alcohol addiction.

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May 31, 2011

Use of Tobacco Among Americans in 2009

Filed under: Substance Abuse — Tags: , — Winson @ 9:38 AM

The National Survey on Drug Use and Health (NSDUH) includes use of tobacco products, including cigarettes, chewing tobacco, snuff, cigars, and pipe tobacco. Cigarette use is defined as smoking tobacco, whereas, chewing tobacco and snuff are combined as smokeless tobacco.

69.7 million Americans aged 12 or older were current users of a tobacco product in 2009 according to the survey. 58.7 million persons were current cigarette smokers, 13.3 million smoked cigars, 8.6 million used smokeless tobacco and 2.1 million smoked tobacco in pipes. The rate of current use of any tobacco product among persons aged 12 or older remained steady from 2008 to 2009.

Adults aged 18 to 25 had the highest rate of current use of a tobacco products in 2009 and the 35.8 percent of adults used cigarettes, 11.4 percent used cigars, 6.1 percent used smokeless tobacco, and 1.7 percent used pipe tobacco.

Among persons aged 12 or older, males are higher than the females who used tobacco. Males also had higher rates of past month use than females of each specific tobacco product which includes cigarettes, cigars, smokeless tobacco and pipe tobacco. Among youths aged 12 to 17, the rate of current cigarette smoking in 2009 was slightly higher for males than for females.

In 2009, current cigarette smoking was more common among unemployed adults aged 18 or older than among adults who were working full time or part time. Among adults aged 18 or older, current cigarette use in 2009 was reported by 35.4 percent of those who had not completed high school, 30.0 percent of high school graduates who did not attend college, 25.4 percent of persons with some college, and 13.1 percent of college graduates.

May 30, 2011

Illicit Drug Use Among Americans in 2009

Filed under: Substance Abuse — Tags: — Winson @ 9:41 AM

The National Survey on Drug Use and Health (NSDUH) included 9 categories of illicit drugs which includes use of marijuana, cocaine, heroin, hallucinogens, and inhalants and the non medical use of prescription type pain relievers, tranquilizers, stimulants, and sedatives. In this survey, hashish is included with marijuana, and crack is considered as a form of cocaine. LSD, PCP, peyote, mescaline, psilocybin mushrooms, and ecstasy are included under hallucinogens. Inhalants includes nitrous oxide, amyl nitrite, cleaning fluids, gasoline, spray paint, other aerosol sprays, and glue.

In United States an estimated 21.8 million Americans aged 12 or older were current users of illicit drugs in 2009. It means that 8.7 percent of the population aged 12 or older are users of illicit drugs. This rate was higher than the rate in 2008.

In 2009, marijuana was the most commonly abused illicit drug and was used by 76.6 percent of current illicit drug users. 42 percent of the illicit drug users abused drugs other than marijuana. Current use of other drugs but not marijuana was reported by 23.4 percent of illicit drug users, and 18.6 percent used both marijuana and other drugs. The estimated number and percentage of persons aged 12 or older who used cocaine in the past month in 2009 were similar to those in 2008. Hallucinogens were used in the past month by 1.3 million persons aged 12 or older in 2009, including 760,000 who had used Ecstasy.

Number of the non medical users of psycho therapeutic drugs in 2009 were higher than in 2008. Statistically significant increases in the percentage using stimulants and sedatives contributed to this increase. Number of non medical users of stimulants increased from 904,000 in 2008 to 1.3 million in 2009. The number of past month methamphetamine users increased from 314,000 in 2008 to 502,000 in 2009. Rates for any psycho therapeutic drug use in 2009 were similar to those in 2007.

May 14, 2011

US Online Advertising Revenues Reached $7.3 billion in the First Quarter of 2011

Filed under: Business — Tags: , — Winson @ 7:39 AM

Advertising has its own role in the success and growth of a business. Today’s trend of online advertising proves the growth of the businesses worldwide. With people turning more towards using Internet, many firms have been enjoying the increase in online advertisement revenues. As per the Interactive Advertising Bureau (IAB) and PricewaterhouseCoopers (PwC), the US online advertising revenues reached $7.3 billion in the first quarter of 2011.

A survey was conducted by the New Media Group of PwC to gather the revenue information. It included data of the online advertising revenues from commercial online services, websites, free e-mail providers and other companies selling online advertising.

The online advertising revenues experienced a 23% increase over the first quarter of 2010. It represent the best first quarter performance in the industry. In the first quarter of 2010, the revenues reached $5.9 billion. The revenues were nearly $5 billion dollars in the first quarter of 2007. These were found to be around $6 billion approximately in the first quarters of 2008 and 2009. The increase in online advertising revenues as of 2011 indicated that the Internet advertising industry had been growing with dynamic energy.

It is found that Americans spend more time online for gathering information and for entertainment purposes. Businesses drag this opportunity, therefore, attracting and retaining customers through digital advertising and marketing. This is meant to further enhance the growth of online advertising trends in the US.

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