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There is a cause and effect relationship between many addictions and diseases. For example, smoking is a choice, but emphysema, lung cancer, etc. it causes, are diseases. Excessive drinking may be a choice, but siroccos of the liver and other related consequences are diseases.
In a non-addiction context, many who chose to work in coal mines, develop/ed tuberculosis or black lung disease. People who spend too much time in the sun often develop melanomas or other cancers. Likewise, don't the majority of recognized diseases have a cause - that is not necessarily a disease?
So, perhaps the question is not so much "what is a disease", but, at what point does a detrimental behavior produce a recognized disease? In a similar vein, all are infected with the deadly "sin disease," but, sin is often only recognized when it produces extreme and detrimental behaviors.
The difference between taking drugs of addiction and taking other risks is the common knowledge that "experimenting" with certain substances reliably leads to addiction. Only some people get addicted to cocaine? Those "some people" include almost everybody who has taken it regularly for a few weeks. The incidence of addiction in people who have tried cocaine even briefly is 75%, ie, far higher than the incidence of lung cancer in people who have worked in asbestos mines (12-17%). Comparisons with other environmental hazards are similar, ie, the majority of the people exposed are still not going to suffer damage to their health (although a significant number will), while among the people who try cocaine, three quarters will become addicted. If you willingly take a chance with 75% risk of catastrophic loss, what kind of financial help does the society owe you? I'd say none.
I am not saying that addicts don't need help - they obviously do. But they should be paying for that help from personal resources, since their addiction is the 75% predictable result of their personal decision to start taking the addictive substance.
I'm wondering if alcoholism and drug addition shouldn't fall under a mental health diagnosis? Are some chemically dependent people suffering from depression and self medicating? What about food addition? Are they masking a deeper problem through food? Yes, addiction is a choice, but what kind of choice? It's self destructive, it's about denial, and it's about relief. It's hard for me to understand how someone could continue down a path that they know could very well end with an early demise. My father did it. He smoked and drank himself to death at 48. I also know he was bat @#$% crazy. Mentally ill? Oh yeah.
Yes I often wonder too.. with so many heavy drinkers in Glasgow where I live.. most dont see 60... and all mostly with their habits...What a sad life for themselves and their families as it causes to much stress and heartache, its selfish and destructive.. xxx for you my lovely friend.
I'm wondering if alcoholism and drug addition shouldn't fall under a mental health diagnosis? Are some chemically dependent people suffering from depression and self medicating? What about food addition? Are they masking a deeper problem through food? Yes, addiction is a choice, but what kind of choice? It's self destructive, it's about denial, and it's about relief. It's hard for me to understand how someone could continue down a path that they know could very well end with an early demise. My father did it. He smoked and drank himself to death at 48. I also know he was bat @#$% crazy. Mentally ill? Oh yeah.
It's a matter of degree, IMO, and your profession. Grants come more easily if they are intended to combat a disease; ergo, a sudden rash of self-inflicted gunshot wounds would soon be so characterized.
Having said that, once addicted, it can be said to fit the definition of "disease."
Also want to mention that some travel insurance companies will charge you very high premium if you plan to pursue risky activities like high-altitude ice climbing or paragliding during your travel, and some companies will not insure you at all. Broken neck after the fall off a rock while climbing surely is an illness, but you know of the risk when you go climbing (and that risk is STILL statistically much lower than the risk of addiction with taking cocaine). I am all in favor of providing health coverage to people that take that kind of risks, as long as the risk-takers pay high health insurance premiums from their own resources.
All I hear about opiates abuse and alcohol abuse is that people are dying of these terrible diseases. Cancer is a disease. MS is a disease. Even the common cold is a disease. How is drinking or eating pills all day to mess with your conscienceless a disease? You did it. How come smoking isn't a disease?
I've often wondered why some addictions are labeled as a disease. To me, a disease is something you get like a cold or cancer not something you willingly choose to do to yourself. If something that you willingly choose to do to yourself is a disease, then isn't everything a disease? Drinking too much chocolate milk, drinking too much wine, eating too many potato chips, eating too much chocolate cake, combing your hair for an hour a day, bathing until your skin peels, etc. Where does it end?
All I hear about opiates abuse and alcohol abuse is that people are dying of these terrible diseases. Cancer is a disease. MS is a disease. Even the common cold is a disease. How is drinking or eating pills all day to mess with your conscienceless a disease? You did it. How come smoking isn't a disease?
It depends upon your definition of a disease, but if a person has some sort of mental or physical condition that is different from the norm that leaves him or her very easily addicted to a drug - particularly one commonly available or, worse, often prescribed for medical reasons like opiates, then, yes, it could be considered a "disease." I prefer the term "condition," though, since disease tends to imply some sort of foreign invader, like catching the flu, etc. But that is really a matter of semantics and doesn't change the treatment or outcome in any way.
One can argue how it should be treated, with the usual right-wing silliness of judging all addictions as a moral failing (right up until the right-winger himself ends up an addict because fate doesn't give a damn about your political beliefs or only punish people who "deserve it"), but that's not relevant to if it is technically a disease, condition, chemical or hormonal imbalance, etc.
One of the reasons that it is classified as a disease besides meeting the criteria, is that enables people to get assistance with having it treated.
The medical model also helps with reducing the stigma. But not very much, apparently.
There are still a lot of people who think "street bum" when they think "addict." But they are our politicians, doctors and nurses, (high rates, there) clergy and teachers. Grandparents and grandchildren. Judges, policemen and lawyers. Wealthy and poor. Good citizens and not-so-good citizens. Smart and dim. (Although, as a rule, it affects brighter people more often than not.)
I always thought a disease was something airborne that could be caught by others... , booze , drugs and cigarettes no..
So cancer is not a disease then. Nor MS. Nor Lou Gehrig's disease. Nor Type 1 Diabetes.
By your definition, diseases are few and far between. Even cholera would not be a disease by your definition since it is not air born.
See how silly it is to try to define disease by what you think is or is not moral? The idea that addiction is not a disease based on some kind of judgment of moral turpitude is ridiculous.
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