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Asked by aiishii to Dalya, Derek, Sarah, Tim, Tom on 15 Jun 2011.
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Sarah Thomas answered on 15 Jun 2011:
Most drugs are designed to mimic one of the body’s natural chemicals. For example, it could be designed to mimic a hormone, or an enzyme. Many new heart disease drugs are designed to mimic a thyroid hormone that can reduce cholesterol. Cholesterol is bad for you because it bungs up your arteries and it is found in high fat foods.
The problem with this is, that in many cases, it is not natural to have such high levels of it over a prolonged period of time and this can upset the body’s natural balance and cause problems or damage to the body in the long term as it fights to regulate itself.
An example of this is steroid abuse in sports. Althetes take steroids in an attempt to improve their performance. The steroid mimics a hormone in the body called testosterone. Because the mimic is in their system, the body stops producing testosterone and this can lead to infertility. High levels of the testosterone mimic can also cause pyschiatric problems such as depression, agression and addiction.
Ecstacy (or MDMA) is a recreational drug that induces a euphoria because it causes the release of neurotransmitters in the brain called seratonin, norepinephrine and dopamine. These are sometimes called stress hormones because they are released during the ‘fight or flight’ response. After the fun effects have worn off, users can feel depressed and anxious and exhausted and an overdose can cause serious damage to your heart. These bad effects are caused by the aftermath of that rush of stress hormones.
I guess the problem with drugs is that they can have negative as well as positive side effects, and they can really upset your body’s biochemical balance. At the end of the day, you are putting something in your body that’s not supposed to be there. When you are taking prescription drugs you have a doctor who can look after you and give you the correct dosage, and who knows what the side effects are, but when you are taking drugs on your own, you just don’t have that safety net.
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Tom Crick answered on 15 Jun 2011:
Hello — drugs can affect people’s behaviour in a number of different ways, but it depends on the type of drug and also the physiology of the person!
This is why it sometimes makes it hard/controversial to legislate for “recreational” drug use…
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Dalya Soond answered on 15 Jun 2011:
I assume you mean illegal drugs? Each work slightly differently, but in general they can give off a pleasant and happy sensation throughout the rest of the brain, which is the ‘high’ from drugs. But it can also cause other behaviour changes such as dangerously fast heart rates, dehydration, anxiety and paranoia.
Here is the general process of how it works:
The drug binds to molecules (receptors) on the surface of neurons in the brain. These receptors change shape once the drug is bound to them If you think about it, it’s sort of like bending down to pick something up….you change your shape to get a job done.
After the receptor changes shape, it starts a signal transduction cascade. Basically, what this means is that an enzymes inside the cell can attach to the newly shaped receptor and can start changing the cell’s behaviour, sometimes permanently. One way cells will change their behaviour by sending instructions to other cells through the release of other chemicals that bind receptors. For instance, the neurons in the brain that bind the drug will send out chemicals that will eventually reach the muscles in your heart to tell them to speed up heart beat.
The receptors that drugs bind are actually there to bind molecules that your body usually makes by itself and help you feel happy (but not so happy that you are high). Illegal drugs often bind these receptors much more strongly than the molecules the body usually makes.
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Tim Millar answered on 15 Jun 2011:
Drugs are chemical compounds which can have many effects in the body. All drugs have side effects and some are worse than others. Sometimes the chemicals are toxic as they are and other times the body itself can even change these chemicals into other chemicals which are then really dangerous usually in theliver.
Drugs can be naturally occuring or man made and even the man made ones usually have side effects. Before we use any drugs we need to make sure that the risks are outweighed by the benefits.
Some drugs used to treat disease like cancer are very toxic so cause a lot of harm but they still work to kill the cancer so the benefit outweighs the risks.
Other drugs that people take for recreation, for the “high” it gives them can have many effects. The risks are still there and because the drugs may not be pure or mixed with other dangerous chemicals they can cause lots of unwanted side effects. Illegal drugs have been made illegal because they can be very damaging.
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Derek McKay-Bukowski answered on 15 Jun 2011:
Some very good answers from the others. I’d also add that apart from physiological damage (this is damage to the body itself), there can also be psychological damage (damage to the way a person thinks or reacts). Additionally, there can be side effects such as reduced reaction times or misjudging things. It can result in anything from a person falling over and injuring themselves, to things like fatal road accidents. Often the victims are not the people taking the drugs, but other people.
Comments
a1berteinstein commented on :
cool
aiishii commented on :
Thanks For Answered Question !!