It’s no secret that Afghanistan is a focal point in the War on Terror and the world’s leader in producing heroin, but there are unintended consequences of these two facts, specifically the increasing number of Afghani women and children who are addicted to drugs.
According to a new study from the Afghan government in coordination with the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC) and RFE/RL’s Radio Free Afghanistan, the female population inside the Afghanistan warzone is turning to illegal drugs and alcohol to overcome disparity of life in the religious tribal nation.
Mohammad Ibrahim Azhar, Afghanistan’s Deputy Counter-Narcotics Minister says there are more than one million Afghans, including women and children, who have succumbed to the addiction of heroin.
The Afghanistan narcotics minister reports that the increase in addiction rates stem from the rise in products made from the opium poppies grown in the economically poor war-torn nation.
The current nine-year war has driven many Afghanis into poverty. That coupled with the social pressures of strict religious beliefs and forced marriages (often at very young ages) has pushed many women to use illicit drugs as a form of escapism, Azhar said.
Also, many women who live in Afghanistan are refused medical treatment for various illnesses and turn to heroin as a painkiller; however once they embark down this road the addiction becomes difficult to kick.