There is a strange dichotomy in every drug. Drugs lift people up, and they knock people out. They are used to heal, and they are used to get high. They boost economies and line purses while shrinking workforces and draining bank accounts. The same drugs manufactured to save life can be used to escape it.
It is often side effects, the unanticipated—or at the very least, unintended—consequences of drug use which have the most significant impact. These side effects are as diverse as they are potent. They are medical, economic, environmental, political and often all of the above.
These side effects—positive, negative, and in between—permeate every area of society. As the U.S. federal government continues to classify cannabis as a Schedule 1 drug alongside heroin and ecstasy, Colorado has earned over half a billion dollars in tax revenue from recreational marijuana, San Francisco and others have promised to reverse decades of marijuana-related convictions, and Peru has added itself to the list of countries that have legalized medical marijuana. Meanwhile, the opioid epidemic has continued to wreak havoc across the rural United States, and politicians have promised to devote more attention to combating prescription drug abuse while taking donations from the very drug companies who stand to profit from it.
In this edition of the HPR, we explore side effects from a variety of different perspectives. In “Is Direct-to-Consumer Pharmaceutical Advertising Right for You?” Minnie Jang dives into the fascinating history of those pesky pharmaceutical ads that flood U.S. airwaves. In “Marijuana, Rx” and “Seeing Through Smoke,” Alexis Mealy and Clara Bates both explore the side effects of marijuana legalization, with the former documenting the lack of progress in medical marijuana research and policy, and the latter discussing the tenuous state of America’s fledgling recreational marijuana industry under Jeff Sessions’ Justice Department. In “Revisiting Recovery,” Meena Venkataramanan discusses developments in youth substance abuse treatment and prevention in Southern Arizona, and in “Emergent Biotechnology,” Christopher Li explains how recent advancements in biotechnology should invite caution as well as excitement. Alongside these articles on side effects are a number of pieces that are no less interesting—on topics ranging from Arctic governance to bigotry in the British Labour Party.
As the HPR embarks on its 50th year as a magazine, we look forward to continuing the same tradition of journalistic excellence that has defined it since its inception. This magazine is the first of four to be published by the HPR’s newest masthead, and I am so proud of the amazing work that our team does each day to make the HPR the nation’s preeminent collegiate political publication. Thank you for reading, and we hope you’ll enjoy.
Image Credit: Flickr/Jamie