Less acres not less drugs
Drug production has gone up in Burma and Afghanistan, the two major opium producing nations of the world. This gives the impression that not much is being done by the outside nations. However, this is the exact opposite of what is being done to counteract the issue. In fact, Burma, which produces 21 percent of the world's opium, has a program instituted to wipe out drug cultivation by 2014 and in Afghanistan the US forces are working with the local officials to stop the farmers from planting the poppy crop. These programs work by getting more and more farmers to grow alternative crops besides poppy.
However, the number of farmers giving up the drug producing cannot compare with the increase in production. Where does this increase come from? Technology and efficacy. United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime executive director Antonio Maria Costa in a report stated:
"Compared to the previous year, opium production has doubled in the southern Shan State despite the acreage showing only a slight increase. This is in part due to additional rains, however, and more disquieting, also due to improved cultivation practices"
Over the years the cultivation technology has gotten much more efficient, which allows farmers to turn out more poppies per capita. This means that even though some farmers have stopped growing poppies and some fields are lost to raids every year the increase in production helps to offset the losses which continues the upward trend in drug production. The war on drugs is truly a war because everyday many battles are fought on fronts all over the world between drug enforcers and drug traffickers. The problem is that neither side is showing any sign of giving up.
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Concerns remain despite drops in opium
British effort to combat Afghan opium trade is causing even more desparation
As the British effort to stop the flow of Afghan opium into the Unite Kingdom continues, more and more Afghan farmers are giving up their poppy cultivation due to the pressure from the Afghan authorities. So far, the fight against opium in Afghanistan appears to have been successful with the nationwide opium cultivation dropping by 21 percent. Moreover, reports show a whopping 96 percent decrease in the Nangahar province.
However, it would seem that the success would only be enjoyed by the British. Because Afghan poppy farmers are being forced to leave their poppy crop, they are growing more and more desparate of finding any other means of supporting their family. According to the Oct 3, 2005
The Independent article, some farmers have resorted to selling their daughters in order to pay the debts to the drug traffickers who lent them money to buy the seeds. This is actually a traditional Afghan practice in which daughters are gifted to pay off the debts. Other methods of income such as growing wheat has proven to be not profitable enough to sustain a family. A farmer could make 25 times more money from growing poppy plants than from growing wheat on a same amount of land.
The article mentions a 68-year-old Afghan poppy farmer, Mohamed Hanif Isamuddin, from Laghman province, next to Nangahar, who was forced by the Afghan authorities to give up his poppy crop. In return, he was promised with free seed to grow alternative crops, which he got none. However, Mr. Isamuddin approved of the government's effort of restricting poppy cultivation:
"The government is doing the right thing... According to our religion, opium is prohibited. But if you have to feed your family, you do what you have to do."
Regardless of the fact that the authorities are slowly winning in their combat against Afghan opium trade, the poor Afghan farmers face grim futures with little to no means of sustaining their family. With growing government pressure on poppy cultivation and no profitable alternative source of income, the Afghan farmers are stuck in a grave deadlock.
Wild poppy and a small dose of jealousy puts two unlikely "drug dealers" in jail
There was a rather amusing
article from
The Independent on Feb 3, 2004, which covers the case of a British couple in Italy who were arrested with charges of drug dealing and cultivating opium poppies to produce morphine. The couple had just moved into their freshly renovated home in Italy when a local in the community claimed that they, Dr. Clive Gillis and his wife Nina, had been growing poppy in their garden for drug dealing. The couple was sentenced to 22 years in jail. Thankfully, all charges were dropped when it was discovered that the poppies were not being cultivated for drugs but were simply growing wild. The amusing part is that judge Niclaflavia Restivo, who dealt with the case, concluded that the case was due to a local's jealousy towards the British couple who had beautifully restored their new property that was once a ruin.
"The root of the problem seems to be jealousy on the part of the locals, for the way they have transformed their farmhouse into an extremely pretty and well-restored home. To see a house come to life seemed to inspire jealousy among locals. Their home is extremely charming and its value has shot up. It would not be the first time that new people in an area were `got at' by this form of sniping, with a view to driving them out of their homes."
Dr. Gillis says that he and his wife knew about the wild poppy plants growing near their house. However, they simply loved how beautiful the plants were and kept some growing. They even asked their neighbors to water them while they were out. Mrs. Gillis did not even know that drugs could be derived from the plant. Who would have thought such unlikely couple was to be labeled as criminals all because of their admiration for beauty? Not only will poppy plant be remembered as the infamous precursor to the notorious drugs like opium and heroin, but will now also be known to have falsely put innocents into jail.
Morphine Produced in Brain
Last year, several researchers finally found the evidence they needed to support the theory that morphine occurs naturally in the human brain. Meinhart Zenk and his colleagues at Martin-Luther-University Halle-Wittenberg in Germany found that human cells grown in a dish produced morphine. Therefore, Zenk concluded:
"Without doubt, human cells can produce the alkaloid morphine."
In the past, many scientists were skeptical about this claim, believing that the samples that were studied were contaminated with morphine molecules. However, the new evidence showed that morphine could indeed occur in the human brain. This presents new possibilities for doctors who are treating patients with a need for morphine. Instead of just giving the patient morphine, doctors could give them a morphine precursor (a molecule that would set off a chain reaction ending with increased morphine production in the brain). This new approach could be very helpful because it can decrease patients' dependency. The discovery could also help explain why some patients do get addicted to morphine: a morphine deficiency.
Wired News: Morphine Apparently in your Head
Afghan women use drugs to cope with pain
The September 30, 2004 article of
The Independent mentions the increase in the number of opium addicts in the war-torn nation of Afghanistan. This may come with no surprise since Afghanistan is the largest supplier of illegal poppy crop in the world. However, according to the article, some people, particularly women, are taking drugs in order to cope with the pains brought about by the long history of wars in Afghanistan. The wars had torn apart families and terrorized many Afghan people.
The article emphasizes how women are especially at risk of using opium based narcotics in Afghanistan. Many of these women have painful memories of their loss from the war. Some are widows who had lost their husbands from the war and were left to face their hopeless futures alone. To cope with their sorrows, many of these unfortunate Afghan women resorted to abusing drugs, such as opium and heroin.
"War trauma is by far the biggest factor among those using opiates. Even if they didn't start abuse during the war, the nightmares are still with them years later."
For example, an Afghan widow mentioned in the article, Halima, smokes opium three times a day to soothe her painful memories of her husband's death when they were trying to flee from the fighting in Kabul.
Taking opiates is forbidden in Islam. Although Afghanistan had been the biggest supplier of opium, heroin, and morphine, the disapproval from the general Afghan community prevented most people from abusing them. However, as the opium trade in the Western world and opium traffickers increased, the number of abusers in Afghanistan went up dramatically. According to Dr Ahmad Shah Habib of the Nejaf rehabilitation centre, heroin was unknown in Kabul 15 years ago. Kabul now has about 60,000 addicts. According to the The Nejaf Centre records, around 2000 of them are women. However, because most women find it too shameful to mention their habits, there is believed to be far greater number of women abusers.
"The growth of heroin factories inside the country and the increasing sophistication of the Afghan drugs industry means production is far greater than before."
The increased production would only make the drugs more accessible. With so many Afghan people with painful memories from the war, great number of people are at great risk of the ever increasing drug abuse in Afghanistan.
Afghan heroin to flow into UK despite all the "countermeasures"
About a month ago on September 25, 2005,
The Independent on Sunday revealed that, despite the British lead multi-million-pound effort to stop Afghan opium trade, Afghan heroin will be flowing into UK for another 10 years. This brings up the question of whether the efforts had been strong enough.
UK became the leading fighter against the Afghan opium trade because nearly 95 percent of the heroin used in UK is from Afghanistan. They were given the position in the campaign over three years ago. However, critics are beginning wonder if the efforts by the UK and US drug enforcers had been sufficient enough over the years. After four years since the fall of Taliban regime in Afghanistan, the poppy cultivation has been greater than ever before. And, now, despite millions of pound spent for the cause of the campaign, Afghan heroin is still flowing into nations like UK. It would seem that their efforts were not good enough.
Farmers going down with their crop
The poppy crop in Myanmar has gone down since the last year. The potential opium production has fallen from 370 tons to 312 tons. Though the decline is a good thing in the sense that less drugs will be produced, it hurts the local farmers. The people most affected by this will be the poor farmers. They rely on the high money yield from their crop because they do not have much room for farming. As the production of poppies declines the farmers will lose the small amount of money they earn and will not be able to supply the essential needs for their families.
But why must the farmers resort to poppy crop? Why not just grow their own food? This is simply because it is very hard to grow enough food for your family on the same amount of land whereas you could grow poppies and have enough money to purchase the food you need. This is why it would be very hard to eliminate poppy plantations in Myanmar. By taking away the income from the farmers and not replacing it with something that can yield the same income you would create a large humanitarian problem with thousands of starving people with no means to help themselves.
Myanmar Central Committee for Drug Abuse Control Police Chief Brigadier-General, Khin Yi, stressed the importance of food security and alternative method of income for the poppy-growing farmers. This would prevent the farmers from going back to cultivating poppy crop.
"Khin Yi, who is also CCDAC secretary, expressed Myanmar's commitment to maintaining the present momentum by relying on its own resources in the launching of a 15-year plan (1999-2014) on totally eradicating drugs in the country."
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Opium cultivation in Myanmar drops in 2005
Endorphin - The Endogenous Opioid
Endorphins are opioids produced in our body. They are produced in the brains of any vertebrates, which includes humans, pigs, and cows etc. More specifically, they are created in the pituitary gland and the hypothalamus.
Endorphin acts like morphine though each has a very different chemical structure. Endorphins are known as the "natural painkillers" because they regulate pain and are produced in body of an organism. When endorphins are released, they create an analgesic effect much like that of a morphine. They relieve the body of pain. Of all the different types of endorphins, beta-endorphins are known to be the chief pain-reliever.
Endorphins were first discovered only 30 years ago in 1975. John Hughes and Hans Kosterlitz of Scotland found these opioid biochemical compounds in the brain of a pig. They called the compound "enkephalin." Later in the United States, Rabi Simantov and Solomon H. Snyder found the same endogenous opioid compound in the brain of a calf and called it "endorphin," abbreviated from "endogenous morphine."
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Overview of Endorphins
Afghan Poppy Crop for Medicine
According to the
Chicago-Sun Times article of May 16, 2005, poppy crops from Afghan farmers can be used for medicine. In order to make this possible, there needs to be added security to monitor the trafficking of Afghan poppy crop. U.S. and Afghan officials say that currently the security in Afghanistan is not high enough to make use of the Afghan poppy for medicine. This is especially shown from the fact that Afghanistan produces more than 4,000 metric tons of opium illegally.
Moreover, according to Emmanuel Reinert, the executive director of the Senlis Council, Afghan poppy production could help to lower prices of morphine and codeine. According to the article, there is a worldwide shortage of morphine and codeine.
"Currently, India and Turkey are the major producers of opium for medicines. Suppliers are licensed and closely monitored by an international control board that requires strict monitoring of the crop."
Reinert estimates the global need to be 10,000 metric tons of opium. As mentioned, Afghanistan produces more than 4,000 metric tons of opium. This amount could greatly contribute to the world supply of morphine and codeine.
The Plant of Joy
The opium extracted from poppy plants has been used to ease peoples' trouble since possibly as early as 4,000 BC. Many civilizations, including the Sumerian, Greek, and Egyptians, used this plant as a means of relieving sorrow. Ancient people either ate parts of the flower or made them into drinks. By the 7th century, the Turkish and Islamic cultures of western Asia discovered that the plant was most effective when smoked. Even today, in some parts of the Middle East, poppy tea is served to mourners at funerals to ease their pain. Greek physicians also used the plant. One Greek physician wrote about the many things opium could cure, including chronic headaches, melancholy, and "the trouble to which women are subject." Even though opium obviously does not cure these ailments, the physicians who prescribed saw its uplifting effects as cures. Some physicians even believed that the poppy plant was a gift from God, to be used as a "Destroyer of Grief."
In the 15th century, a man known as Paracelsus made an important discovery concerning opium. It was discovered that the alkaloids in opium are significantly less soluble in water than in alcohol. So Paracelsus made a sort of "witch's brew," which he called laudanum, out of opium, brandy, and some extra ingredients. These ingredients were later refined by the English physician, Thomas Sydenha, during late 1600s.
By the late 1700s, most of the world's poppy plantations were controlled by the British East India Company. In the mid 1800s, when opium imports increased greatly, even children were introduced to opiates in the form of syrups. Parents used these as a way to keep their children calm and soothed. People viewed opiates, such as heroin, as mere medicines and were unaware of their addictive potential.
Opium was used in China as a recreational drug long before the British East India Company had the monopoly on poppy plants. Although the drug had been outlawed by the Imperial Chinese court, it was still widely sold. In 1839, however, the emperor took action. He ordered the confiscation of 20,000 barrels of opium. The British, who were at the time making money from opium, were not very happy about the confiscation. They fought back and attacked the port-city of Canton. This was the beginning of the First Opium War. Though the British won, peace did not last very long as the Second Opium War began and ended in 1856. The British were once again victorious, and there was more opium in China than ever before. By the end of the 19th century, more than one-fourth of the male population in China was addicted to opium.
Source:
A Brief History of Opium
Driving Under the Influence of Poppy Seeds
A man in Chicago, Charles Hausberg, was convicted of making an illegal U-turn resulting in the death of a 15-year-old. However, he was acquitted claiming that he had been under the influence of morphine after eating poppy seed muffins. There was indeed high opiate level detected in Hausberg's blood and urine. Hausberg claimed that he had eaten quite a few poppy seed muffins between the night before and the time of the accident. He was let go on the basis that he could not be accused of taking an illegal drug.
Cynthia Woods, a chemist at the Northern Illinois Crime Lab, and James O'Donnell, a pharmacologist hired as an expert witness for Hausberg, both confirmed Hausberg's claim saying that poppy seeds contain opiates. However, it is hard to believe that Hausberg had eaten enough poppy seed muffins in such a short amount of time to impair his driving skills. Some people believe that Hausberg's excuse was not entirely true because the opiate level in poppy seed muffins is not enough to induce a "high." Even if Hausberg did eat a lot of poppy seed muffins, he would have become full long before experiencing any sort of judgment impairing effects. Therefore, Hausberg is either a dirty liar or merely a man who loves his poppy seed muffins.
Sources:
United Press InternationalPoppy seeds tied to DUI acquittal
Will poppy-seed bagels cause you to fail a drug test?
Mutant Poppies
A new kind of "mutant" poppy has been developed that produces ingredients for making useful medicine instead of morphine. The altered plant was actually introduced several years ago in 1995, but studies of the mutant poppy were not published until recently. In the mutant poppy, there is a glitch which prevents the normal process of making morphine and it accumulates two compounds, orapavine and thebaine, the latter of which is used to make certain medicines.
Before, pharmaceutical companies needed to convert morphine into thebaine to make a variety of painkillers, such as buprenorphine, oxycodone, naloxone, and naltrexone. However, it is said that starting with thebaine is more efficient, and the new type of mutant poppy makes this possible.
Peter Facchini of the University of Calgary in Alberta, who studies poppy biochemistry, says that, though low-morphine mutant poppies are often common and easily found, it is hard to find a mutant poppy that produces something useful like thebaine, a commercial drug precursor.
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Scientists Develop Mutant Poppies
