Colonnade

Issue date: 11/21/08 Section: Campus News

Most prescription medication comes in a little transparent orange container, neatly labeled, with a child-proof twist off cap reading "Push Down & Turn".

But some always get their medication sealed inside the cellophane wrapper from a pack of Marlboros.

Little orange and blue pills.

Time in a capsule coupled with the self-enhancing powers unrivaled by any drug on the market, underground or not.

Adderall to focus before class, Xanax before a presentation or OxyContin to have a good time - college prescription junkies are an FDA stamp away from their street counterparts.

Oxy Contin, for example, is an opiate - just like heroin. Excruciating withdrawal results, financial anguish and shady behavior come with regular abuse. Ironically, a symptom of continual opiate abuse is depression, which is what OxyContin, in many cases, treats.

In a survey of 41 people conducted by The Colonnade, 68 percent of people said that they, or someone they knew, self-medicated a mental illness with prescription drugs not prescribed to them.

Our generation is not waiting until middle age to add prescription pill-popping to its list of abuses.

"It's amazing the number of students on medication," Dr. James Winchester, philosophy professor, said. "Students taking things like Ritalin and students grappling with psychological issues are astounding. I don't know if there is a supporting study, but I believe that there are more cases of psychological issues on this campus because of its size. Fragile students are more interested in a smaller institution with a smaller class size."

The sleepy town of Milledgeville cannot escape society's fast-paced demands and never-ending commitments. The underground market, or shall we say underground pharmacy, for prescription drugs on campus mirrors that of the underground market for street-drugs.

Sometimes the two markets collide.

"I've heard of people swapping pills, or trading marijuana for Adderall or something like that," Tradd Raizes, a student at Georgia Military College said.

A bartering system of uppers and downers emerges, allowing users to entertain the drug-cycle. Something in which many college students enter into on a weekly basis.

"It goes like this; you get all 'Adderall-ed out' before class with your Starbucks Venti Skinny Vanilla Latte. Between classes you chain-smoke like it's your business, then when the day is finally over you chill out with a bowl [of marijuana]or a glass of wine before homework commences. This is when you probably take another Adderall. Hence the cycle continues," said an anonymous, senior, in a giddy whirl-wind of a conversation, which hinted at her current state. "I find myself making lists in my head of everything I have to do. I usually forget to eat. I like it though. This is how you have to be though, seriously."

Often pills are crushed and snorted, providing a quicker and stronger effect.

In addition to increasing attentiveness, methylphenidate, an ingredient in Adderall and Ritalin, increases that get-up-and-go feeling of well-being and comfort, and often causes the consumer to become chattier.

Other short-term effects include faster heart rate and breathing, increased blood pressure, dilated pupils, dry mouth, perspiration, and a feeling of superiority. More severe side effects include violent behavior and aggression, or even strange, incessant and restless behavior. Weight loss is also common. Flushing, tremors, and hallucinations are symptoms of an overdose. The effects of methylphenidate are often likened to those of cocaine and studies have shown similarities in the two.

According to the federal government's National Survey on Drug Use and Health taken earlier this year, the number of first time prescription drug abusers outnumbered first-time marijuana users.

According to the National Survey, the nonmedical use of prescription medications is second only to marijuana as the most common form of illicit drug use; in addition, the percentage of students reporting the abuse of prescription stimulants can be as high as 25 percent on some campuses.
The survey conducted by The Colonnade shows similar results. In the survey, the percentage of people abusing alcohol, as a way to self-medicate, is exactly the same as the percentage of people illegally using prescription drugs for self-medication, 32.08 percent. Marijuana followed closely behind at 26.42 percent.

The increasing numbers means a $79 billion industry for prescription meds.

For example, United States prescriptions for stimulants increased from about 5 million in 1991 to almost 35 million in 2007. Prescriptions for painkillers such as OxyContin and Vicodin increased from 40 million in 1991 to 180 million in 2007, according to the Mayo Clinic Web site.

Perhaps the large increase arises from the lessened Federal Food and Drug Administration regulations for direct-to-consumer advertising in 1997, allowing commercial drugs to be seen and heard on home television sets and car radios.

"I haven't heard of too many students doing coke, none doing crack, a small number dropping acid, but the number of people who have taken Adderall…I can't even count," Kristen Mecerod, a senior marketing major, said.

"There's a proliferation of diagnosis. It seems to be the contemporary and modern thing-running to your psychiatrist," said Brittany Curry, a liberal studies major. "[Why not] eat Ritalin for breakfast instead of improve your work ethic?"

Possession or distribution of prescription can lead to drug-related criminal charges. The potential for mandatory minimum prison sentences-sometimes a decade or more for relatively minor offenses-along with license suspensions, lengthy and restrictive terms of probation, mandatory drug treatment, hefty fines, taxes, forfeiture of property, and limitations on future employment prospects, which means that dealing with prescription drugs is serious.

Tendering a false prescription with a forged doctor signature or calling in a fraudulent prescription are considered felonies.

Possession of prescription drugs such as Adderall, OxyContin, Xanax, Lortab, and Ritalin in any container without a prescription is a felony crime as well.