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Chapter 8
Myth, Misunderstanding & Stigma
Robert B. Kahn, Ph.D.
The continued hesitation by many to recognize addiction as a medical
disease may be symptomatic of a societal ambivalence about the use
of drugs. Many Americans regularly consume some psychoactive
drugs including alcohol, cigarettes, and caffeine, as well as
prescription medications - especially for anxiety and depression.
Anti-anxiety medications alone, for example, accounted for $1 billion
in expenditures in 1996 and an estimated 100 million prescriptions
were written in 1999.
Understandably, few people can identify themselves with injection
drug users and consequently there is little empathy or compassion for
them. This dynamic is only one of several factors that can lead to
myth and misunderstanding about opioid addiction and methadone
treatment. Interestingly, this dynamic seems to lessen significantly for
the use of alcohol or prescription drugs and, to some extent, with
tobacco, marijuana, or even cocaine. Presumably, this is because more
people are familiar with, and therefore can more easily identify with,
these types of drug use, as they have become more of a social norm
compared to injecting heroin.
