The stigma of addiction to drugs, alcohol and discrimination in the Hispanic community

The stigma of addiction to drugs, alcohol and discrimination in the Hispanic community
Jorge Yeshayahu Gonzales-Lara The stigma experienced by the Hispanic community is one of the most humiliating and most difficult of addiction, and that makes it harder for individuals and families to address their problems and get the help they

need. According to the National Health Interview Survey, 2008, Hispanic adults are the largest ethnic group that consumes the most alcohol in the United States. The Hispanic / Latino population is considered more accurately as a mosaic of cultures. The different Hispanic groups reflect great ethnic and cultural differences and have few common characteristics. The Hispanic community covering the entire spectrum racial Hispanics can be white, African-Americans, Asians or Native Americans. Moreover, diversity extends to nationality, customs, ancestry, lifestyle and socioeconomic status. In the Hispanic community there are similarities especially related to language (Spanish) and religion (Catholic), profound differences in background and life experiences among the various groups directly affect their health. The Latino / Hispanic according to the latest census in New York reaches 2867.583, representing 15.1% and is composed mainly originating in the Dominican Republic, Puerto Rico, Colombia, Ecuador, Mexico, El Salvador. Hispanics reside mostly in New York City, Buffalo, Rochester, Syracuse, and Albany Amherst. Addiction and abuse drugs and alcohol affect the entire mosaic Hispanic cultures.

Society imposes stigma and creates damage to addicts and their families, because many of us still believe that addiction is a character flaw or weakness that probably cannot be cured. Addiction is a chronic relapsing brain disease characterized by compulsive seeking and drug use, despite harmful consequences. It is considered a brain disease because drugs change the brain change its structure and how it works. These changes can last a long time and lead to harmful behaviors seen in people who abuse drugs.

The stigma against people with addictions is so deeply rooted in society that continues even in the face of scientific evidence that addiction is a treatable illness and even though we know that people in our families and the diverse communities that live wonderful lives long-term recovery, because addiction is a disease that affects the brain.

The stigma is the reason why there are so many legal and social discrimination of people with addictions. This explains why addicts and their families seek to hide the disease. Agencies that deal with this illness become police enforce, to report the patient relapses suffered to the justice system rather than trying to explain the relapse and seek appropriate treatment. This practice creates the stigma that the patient is a "criminal" that does not cure the disease because addiction is a process over time that courses through various stages and characteristics change according to the severity of the problem. People often have to add one or two medical problems associated with addiction, including pulmonary and cardiovascular diseases, stroke, or cerebrovascular attacks, various cancers and mental disorders, recent studies show that often is the coexistence of Abuse drug and mental disorders and in some cases, mental diseases may precede addiction; in other cases, drug abuse may trigger or exacerbate mental disorders, particularly in people with specific vulnerabilities. Stigma only hides and distorts the scientific evidence about the disease.

Discrimination stigmatizes people with the disease of addiction because they are excluded from the rules that apply to "normal" people. Insurance companies often refuse to pay for treatment of alcohol or drugs, or charging higher deductibles and co-payments for treatment of other illnesses. People who need help are often afraid to speak.

State and federal agencies feel safe in denying food stamps and infant formula to mothers who have drug convictions because mothers who have used drugs a few supporters in the political system and a lot of faces of people who think they must be "bad mothers ". Clearly, this stigma is based on nonscientific criteria but on the

perception that the addict or the addict likes this kind of life, including the stigma is in the health professionals that are expressed in commentaries based on creating social prejudices a stigma of the person who needs help. In the judicial system is most evident through the penalty.

Addiction is a primary disease that affects the brain, consisting of a set of characteristic signs and symptoms. The origin of addiction is engaging multifactorial biological, genetic, psychological, and social. Studies show that there are neurochemical changes involved in people with addictive disorders and also there biogenetic predisposition to develop this disease. The neurochemistry of addiction is much clearer now because research in the last decade.It attributes the meso limbic system, locus of addictive disorder. Denial, deception and distortions of thought typical of addiction, form a well-nourished delusional system trapping the addict in a circle of deterioration. Addiction is a treatable disease and recovery is possible. Although studies have found that helps employees to recover is more profitable than the end, some employers believe that firing an employee with a drinking problem is much easier to provide rehabilitation. A storm of protests that arise if employers treated workers with cancer or heart disease in the same way.

People who are victims of stigma internalize the hate that leads to transformation of shame and concealment of its effects. Too often, people with drug and alcohol problems and their families begin to accept the ideas that addiction is their own fault and that may be too weak to do anything about it. In many ways, lies a problem of addiction is rational to seeking help because it can mean losing their jobs and health insurance, or even the loss of his son when a social service agency declares that a parent unfit because it has an alcohol or drug problem.

The stress of hiding often causes other medical problems such as depression for people and their families. This is especially true when a teen has a drug or alcohol problem. Fear often asks children and young people to hide the problem from parents. So when parents discover, stigma makes them feel guilty and somehow negligent. Illness and family dysfunction explode. When that happens, parents find it even harder to fight for the care and resources for your child badly in need of social and medical system that blames the family, mother, father, child or young person suffering from this disease. Treatment for addiction is a series of structured clinical interventions in a way that is useful to promote and support the recovery of a person affected by addiction to a better quality of life.

Each person is a different person with different life situations and different needs. The individualization of treatment is a key factor in the ultimate success of treatment, as indicated by recent research on the subject. http://thecounselorblog.blogspot.com/ Posted 8 minutes ago by La Diaspora Peruana