Alcohol vs hard drugs

Alcohol is one substance I have termed "the slow killer" because of how harmless it might seem at the surface level but it brings a lot of damage in the long run when consumed frequently. On the other hand, hard drugs are worse when it comes to the negative side effects that come with them and even though alcohol might be the lesser evil in this case, both are generally disastrous in the long run, although I would say that hard drugs abuse has a more immediate effect than alcohol abuse.

When it comes to the damaging effects of both of them, there are slight differences but in the end, the two organs that take the biggest hit from the abuse of alcohol and hard drugs are the kidneys and liver. The one thing that scares me about hard drugs is the mental health issues that come with it. I mean, I have never seen anybody that went crazy because of alcohol, the most that can happen is losing consciousness or in extreme cases; death. Hard drug on the other hand is king when it comes to mental health issues, as I have seen people lose their senses and go outright mad because of hard drugs.

One example of such drugs is Colorado or as we call it in Nigeria; colos. In 2020, lots of videos trended on Twitter of people acting crazy after taking it, and then there is the set of people who went crazy after smoking God-knows-what. Anyway, alcohol is different, and like I said earlier the most that can happen is passing out or death in some rare cases. I have actually passed out because of alcohol and this happened during my first year in the university. The hangover that came the next day made me swear to stay away from alcohol, and thinking about the health risks that come with it made that decision easier.

The immediate effect of alcohol especially on someone who is already drunk is the lack of judgement and coordination. If you have ever been drunk (even though it's just tipsy), you would understand how difficult it is to walk properly or even see properly. Your senses become impaired and you will find it hard to control your body, which is technically not much of a problem unless you get into a vehicle and start driving! That's where the problem lies; drunk driving. From the statistics I got online, alcohol kills around 3 million people every year.

5% of all deaths is a big number for something legal and easily accessible, so wouldn't banning it be the best option? I mean, theoretically, it will benefit us as a society by reducing the number of alcohol-related diseases and deaths and lowering the rate of alcohol-influenced accidents and violence. But things aren't as simple as that, because we all know that when something popular gets banned, it leads to the rise of Black markets for that product; people will start the illegal production and distribution of alcohol.

Hard drugs are currently banned but does that stop people from having access to them? One thing about most people is that they love going after something that is forbidden (remember Adam and Eve?), and even the Bible said "Stolen waters are sweet, And bread eaten in secret is pleasant". Banning alcohol would definitely make it more popular than it already is, and even more expensive. Let's not also forget that the alcohol industry is a very big business, banning alcohol would mean that many people would lose their jobs.

At the end of the day, we can't ban our way out of this problem and the only thing that can be done is to educate people on the dangers of prolonged alcohol abuse. It's one thing to drink alcohol seldomly but consuming it regularly is a big problem, especially when you consider the fact that it can quickly become an addiction and from there it's just a rabbit hole that leads to death. Banning alcohol might benefit us as a society when you think about it but in reality, it won't solve anything when the ban gets implemented and will even make things worse. Cheers 🥂

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