How Can Photographers Capture Drug Addiction?

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With the continuing rise in the opioid use menace, payspi.org have found a new strategy to capture addiction from frequent drug users. Opioid has turned out to be as addictive as opium itself with many families being affected by the menace. Many people can’t be successful in passing a drug test if it’s carried out randomly on different individuals.

Origin of the idea to capture drug addiction

It was on 8th September 2016 in Ohio city in eastern Liverpool when two photos were taken, capturing male and female addicts lying unconscious in a car after taking the opioid. The most noticeable thing in the photo is the image of a young baby lying at the back seat of the car. The baby was wearing a T-shirt with a dinosaur image.

The two pictures were shared online on Facebook. They went viral among Facebook users. These pictures were undeniable proofs that the country was at the edge of an opioid menace if not tackled soon enough.

The situation at the ground

Today, drug menace has spread tremendously. A good number of people in the country are reported to be addicted to either heroin or prescription pain medication. The case is sad news in the ears of most people as in 2006, 2.1 million people were estimated to be addicted to the drugs.

According to Philip Montgomery, the drug needle is believed not to discriminate anyone as most people from different fields have become addicts. Philip Montgomery is a photographer who recently captured a picture in New Yorker on the disturbing opioid menace. He said that any person can become an addict as the addiction case has affected lawyers, footballers, nurses, and other professionals. Even mothers at home are facing this menace of opioid addiction.

Origin of the use of opioid

Opioid addiction has its roots back to the period during America’s Civil War. During the Civil war in America, the use of morphine became a common phenomenon among injured war veterans. The abuse of the drug came after as the drug was sold cheaply in shops to be used as pain relievers for the most ailment. With the introduction of heroin by Bayer Pharmaceutical Company to substitute the morphine, the addiction menace skyrocketed. The US government passed a law in 1914 with an aim of taxing opiate and products of the coca plant. the government would later become more aggressive and categorized the substance use as drugs abuse. Within no time, users were seen as immoral criminals on the loose.

The works of photographers like Nan Goldin, Eugene Richards, and Larry Clark saw drug abuse in America reimagined half a century later. In their photos, they captured young people abusing methamphetamines as they played along with guns by shooting around. Clark’s photography portrays drug use as not shameful even if it’s dangerous and foreign. Goldin, on the other hand, portrays a couple having sexual intimacy fueled by heroin.

Purdue Pharma campaigned a lot on an OxyContin, a new pain medication. The prescription became widespread despite its addictive nature. This would, in turn, relight the abuse of heroin.

Today, the opioid abuse is on the rise as proved by photos taken by a Canadian photographer, Aaron Goodman. In another photo taken by Goodman, the subjects are seen injecting herself with heroin. The Scottish photographer, Graham MacIndoe, took her own caption of when he was an addict. He is now a recovered substance abuser.

As indicated by all the trending captions, drug abuse is emerging as a disaster to this generation and the one to come. Passing a drug test for the next generation will not be that easy.

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