Adolescents — drug abuse and addiction

Abstract

Drug taking by young people has been described and debated almost to saturation point by professional and lay people alike. This is not only because of the many connecting professional links in medicine, the law, the social sciences, moral philosophy, psychology, and education, but also because it has a personal impact on every young family in the country. No parent who has the welfare of his children at heart is not concerned at some stage of their development lest one or other of them fall prey to this pervasive threat. It is essentially the adolescent in the flush of his emancipation from adult control who is most at risk. © 1972, British Medical Journal Publishing Group. All rights reserved.