Drugs
Drugs are notoriously difficult to define and yet present some of the most difficult ethical issues for the science and technology on which they are based. At the simplest level, drugs are molecules whose biochemical effects have been classified as socially desirable or undesirable in different times and places. Dorland's Medical Dictionary defines a drug as a "chemical compound that may be used on or administered to humans or animals as an aid in the diagnosis, treatment, or prevention of disease or other abnormal condition, for relief of pain or suffering, or to control or improve any physiologic or pathologic condition" (p. 510). But this ignores so-called recreational drugs, which may be described as substances used mainly for their psychoactive properties and pleasurable effects.
Historically drugs have been derived from plants and other natural materials and thus their production relied on indigeneous forms of knowledge and premodern techniques, often appropriated for modern applications. Over half of drugs in clinical use today continue to be derived from natural sources—including the excretions of insects, animal organisms, or microbes—from which they are extracted through direct or indirect processes (Aldridge 1998). The other half is synthesized through chemical processes that are now industrialized.
This page contains 201 words.
Drugs article
Read the rest of this article.
This article contains 2,267 words
(approx. 8 pages at 300 words per page).
Order our Drug Article
