Geography and Drug Addiction

Making Connections: Geography and Drug Addiction Geography involves making connections – connections in our world among people and places, cultures, human activities, and natural processes. It involves understa- ing the relationships and ‘connections’ between seemingly disparate or unrelated ideas and between what is and what might be. Geography also involves connecting with people. When I rst encountered an extraordinarily vibrant, intelligent, and socially engaged scientist at a private d- ner several years ago, I was immediately captivated by the intensity of her passion to understand how and why people become addicted to drugs, and what could be done to treat or prevent drug addiction. Fortunately, she was willing to think beyond the bounds of her own discipline in her search for answers. Our conversation that evening, which began with her research on fundamental biochemical processes of drug addiction in the human body, evolved inevitably to an exploration of the ways in which research on the geographical context of drug addiction might contribute to the better understanding of etiology of addiction, its diffusion, its interaction with geographically variable environmental, social, and economic factors, and the strategies for its treatment and prevention. This fascinating woman, I soon learned, was Nora Volkow, the Director of the National Institute on Drug Abuse as well as the granddaughter of Leon Trotsky.

The research in this book on the geographical context of drug addiction contributes to better understanding the etiology of addiction, its diffusion, its interaction with geographically variable environmental, social, and economic factors, and the strategies for its treatment and prevention. This book explores links between geography and drug abuse and identifies research ideas, connections, and research pathways which point to some promising avenues for future work in this area.

The topics explored in Geography and Drug Addiction include:

• Spatial patterns of drug use and addiction
• Linking spatial models with drug abuse research
• Interaction of social and environmental factors with biochemical processes of addiction
• Locational analyses of drug addiction treatment and service delivery facilities
• Neighborhood scale studies of geographic factors (including the built environment) and their interaction with drug addiction, treatment, or prevention
• Use of Geographic Information Systems (GIS) to better understanding and respond to drug addiction
• Spatial diffusion modeling of addictive drug usage and its changing characteristics, including also predictive modeling
• Social epidemiology and GIS

This book will serve as an excellent resource to geographers and drug abuse researchers, including sociologists, epidemiologists, social scientists in general and public health researchers, both in policy and academia.