Essay Draft 2

The path into and out of drug addiction revolves around choice. Nowhere in the definition is choice addressed. Addiction is a compulsive behavior, implying loss of control, but a decision triggers the chain of events leading to that loss of control. Choice is the trigger for addiction, both into and out of.

            Addiction is not a hereditary disease. As defined in Merriam Webster’s Dictionary, a disease is “a disordered or incorrectly functioning organ, part, structure, or system of the body resulting from the effect of genetic or developmental errors, infection, poisons, nutritional deficiency or imbalance, toxicity, or unfavorable environmental factors.”  Addiction does not consist of either genetic or developmental errors. Arguably, “crack babies,” babies born to crack/heroin addicts with a physical dependency to the drug supplied in the womb, would have inherited addiction. However, as newborn babies, their minds are not developed enough to make decisions yet. Although these babies’ paths into addiction were not a choice, their path out of addiction can be. Statistics say that the offspring of an alcoholic is in greater danger of also becoming an alcoholic. Addiction, however, isn’t necessarily inheritable, because there is no single ‘addiction gene.’ Environmental factors do play a role in the likelihood of the child of an addict becoming an addict, but that doesn’t define addiction as a disease. Addiction only matches one characteristic of the dictionary’s definition of a disease.

            When compared to already-recognized diseases, such as cancer, there’s room for differentiating. While both addiction and cancer have recognizable symptoms, the symptoms of cancer can’t be stopped by choice, but the symptoms of addiction can. It’s where the line between choice and disease lies. When compared to lifestyle diseases, such as type-2 diabetes, in which a choice to change diet can eliminate symptoms, addiction remains different. Addiction isn’t a lifestyle disease because it involves behavior, affecting chemistry in the mind rather than the body.

            The theory that addiction is a disease is potentially a conspiracy. If addiction were to be scientifically accepted as a disease, doctors would begin researching a drug treatment. According to Bill Urell, an addiction therapist of sixteen years, this would provide large revenue in medical treatment. Arguments for the disease theory say that addiction is incurable, but treatable, and yet, millions of addicts have overcome their addictions without the aid of a treatment drug. Substituting the drug of dependency cannot combat dependency on a drug.

            If addiction is to be considered a choice, can drug addicts even make conscious choices? While drug use does addle the brain, that doesn’t necessarily mean that drug users can’t make conscious decisions. According to neuroscientist Jeffrey Schwartz, in The Mind and the Brain, a person’s daily habits influence the way their brain structures. Long-term use of a drug evokes a change in the brain’s structure. A taxi driver, for example, develops a larger posterior hippocampus in order to understand maps as part of his occupation. Similarly, a drug addict’s brain structure changes, accustomed to the drug’s effects. Conscious decisions can be made.

            Addiction is not a disease. It doesn’t fall under the terminology for being a disease. It revolves around choices, a choice of mind over matter. Addicts make the decision to take the substance that begins their compulsive behavior. Addicts will lose their home, health, friends, and sometimes even their sanity to the behavior they become a prisoner to. Once addicts reach the rock bottom of their habits, they find the willpower to make the choice to turn their lives back around. It would be a false dilemma to tell an addict that they will never be cured.