Home > Drug use and drug markets in the context of political conflict: The case of Northern Ireland.

McElrath, Karen (2004) Drug use and drug markets in the context of political conflict: The case of Northern Ireland. Addiction Research & Theory, 12, (6), pp. 577-590. https://doi.org/10.1080/16066350412331323056.

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The focus of this article addresses drug use and drug markets in Northern Ireland against the backdrop of the most recent Irish political conflict, e.g., 1969 to the present. Between 1969 and 1999, a total of 3289 individuals had died and more than 40,000 were injured as a result of the Northern Ireland political conflict. Extrapolating the data to Britain, comparable figures would reflect 111 000 fatalities and over one million injured (Hayes and McAllister, 2000).

This paper describes how the nature of the Northern Ireland political conflict contributed to low levels of drug use in the 1970s and 1980s. In 1994, the cessation of military operations by the Irish Republican Army (IRA) and subsequently by mainstream Loyalist organizations led to the possibility of widespread political and social change. Use of certain drugs, namely heroin, appeared to increase from the mid-1990s, although the effects of political conflict on drug use are less clear during the post-ceasefire era.


Item Type
Article
Publication Type
Irish-related, Open Access, Article
Drug Type
Substances (not alcohol/tobacco)
Intervention Type
Crime prevention
Date
December 2004
Identification #
https://doi.org/10.1080/16066350412331323056
Page Range
pp. 577-590
Publisher
Informa healthcare
Volume
12
Number
6
EndNote
Accession Number
HRB 4051 (Available)
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