The long term effects of drug abuse and life expectancy.

The long term effects of drug abuse and life expectancy Habitual drug use has been a societal issue for as long as there have been societies, and it’s clear that things need to change. Drugs, like heroin, cocaine, and methamphetamine, are getting easier to purchase and consume, which only increases the number of times users are compelled to take them. In fact, it’s not uncommon to hear accounts of people taking drugs two, four, or even five times per day. Given this information, we asked ourselves – how does habitual drug use affect the life expectancy of users?

When looking at the daily use of the four substances, we found that if users take any of them even once per day, they could lose at least 10 years off of their life. Additionally, if users take any of these drugs 5 times per day, they could subtract between 30-50 years off of their life, which is horrifying to think about.

Cocaine is the least life-draining when compared to the other substances, but the potential for life lost was still significant. Depending on the number of times it’s used per day, the user could lose between 10-30 years off of their lives. Heroin had the most life lost across the board. Interestingly, we found that if a user takes heroin just once a day, they would lose 30 years off of their life, which is almost as many years as taking cocaine 5 times a day. That number climbs to 50.9 years if the use increases to 5 times daily.