Pakistan’s rising Drug Problem

Drug Abuse is on the rise among the youth of Pakistan

Pakistan is a country which have faced many problems since the beginning. Poverty, Illiteracy rate, unemployment, domestic violence are just a few to name. The rise of fundamentalism and extremism pushed the country in a state of perpetual war, until it was dealt with in a Military Operation in last few years, yet still a lot is required to be done.

One issue which has been neglected in our country is the rise of drug problem. Pakistan’s drug issue is a result of smuggled drugs from Afghanistan, since 1980’s. Just like weapons, Afghan War also brought the drugs in Pakistan and since then this problem is on the rise!

United Nations estimate suggests that the number of Pakistanis who are addicted drug users, number around 10 million people. This is 5% of the whole population of Pakistan and the real number might actually be much higher than the suggested number.

In recent years when the Government’s focus entirely shifted towards getting rid of the terrorism, the drug problem might have seemed rather innocuous problem, however the reality is much different. High number of drug addicts are largely young people. If the future of this country and a work force which is supposed to be productive is instead dependent on the usage of drugs doesn’t work well for anyone.

The most alarming thing is the blatant disregard of the drug problem from our country’s Government. There is no program to talk about this rising drug problem, neither is there any program to tell how would we deal with this problem. The programs which are currently in place are either too small to counter this big threat or are simply ineffective.

Even more painful is the fact that our country has developed a media which is not functioning under any dictatorship and have a huge following and impact, yet it chooses to stay silent and ignore the problem of drug abuse.

If one can learn anything from history than it would suggest that America up till 2000’s had no real problem with drugs. However if one looks deeply than one would know that American Government chose to stay quiet about the drug problem and today America’s urban centers are deep into this problem, causing the rise of crime, violence, health problems and unemployment. The city of Detroit, declared its Bankruptcy in 2013 (had 80%+ Black Population) as it suffered deeply from Drug related problems. Similarly, China required Mao Zedong’s revolution to counter a century of Drug Abuse problem, we certainly don’t want to be in that sort of situation.

If Pakistan has anything to learn from these historical mistakes by the fellow humans then its Government will cease to be a silent spectator and become more proactive in dealing with this dire issue of drugs.