Abstract: In 2003, Hon Lik, a Chinese pharmacist and inventor, created what would become the first commercially successful e-cigarette. Hon Lik’s invention quickly swept across the continent, gaining popularity and ultimately being introduced to the European market in April 2006. From Europe, it was a quick hop across the pond to the United States. This new, “safe” form of smoking quickly spread throughout the states. This wave quickly formed a new, highly profitable industry. With such a rapid rise to popularity, governing bodies such as the Food and Drug Administration and Federal Trade Commission have not yet regulated this industry effectively. Although, steps are being taken to do so, the damage has been done. The vaping industry has successfully targeted the youth population, creating high rates of teen and adolescent addiction. Similar to the vaping epidemic plaguing the United States, in 2011, there were approximately 20.6 million people in the United States over the age of 12 with an addiction ranging from alcohol to inhalants and hallucinogens. This number has only grown in recent years. This is why it is paramount to be able to model and predict which communities are most at risk and assess the true cost of addiction. Through complex mathematical modelling and analysis, the ability to assess the prevalence and impact of alcohol, nicotine, marijuana, and nonprescription drugs is available today.
Keywords: Substance abuse, nonfinancial and financial impacts, alcohol, marijuana, and tobacco.
Introduction: While the United States is currently experiencing an opioid epidemic with over 72,000 people dying each year from overdoses, there have also been increases in the use of other drugs such as nicotine, marijuana, and alcohol throughout the country. This is especially concerning due to an increasing proportion of the demographic is middle schoolers and high schoolers. Moreover, this is the first time in the history of the United States that the leading cause of death is opioid overdose (it surpassed vehicle crashes). It is important to understand the factors that lead individuals to use these substances so that the spread can be effectively combatted.
This section addresses the problem of addiction in society. We focus on the United States specifically and limit our model to the following drugs: nicotine, marijuana, prescription drugs, alcohol.
The problem is to create a model that can accurately predict the spread of nicotine. This is followed by the creation of a model that can be applied to different drugs with inputs depending on an individual's income, education level, and race. These factors were chosen because we determined them to be the most significant factors in terms of influencing people to do drugs. We would have also liked to include calculations involving environmental factors such as family use and ease of access but due to time and calculating restraints, we omitted these variables.
Because of the advancement in technology, people try to find an alternative for smoking cigarettes. They found this alternative in vaping. As a result, cigarette sales are reaching an all-time low (as shown in the graph below). Overall, this indicates that the growth of vaping will more than replace the decreasing usage of cigarettes.
Our models functioned on several assumptions. We assumed that nationwide trends are directly applicable to all individual populations, which may not be the case. A study can be conducted to provide evidence of drug usage in specific areas across the country in order to pinpoint our data.
The spread of nicotine abuse as well as the abuse of other drugs is on the rise throughout the country. This is especially alarming in the younger generation as model 2 suggests. The amount of high school seniors predicted to be using these substances indicates a societal issue that needs to be addressed in order to prevent damage to today's youth and lower these numbers for later generations. The impact of these drugs, while varied between them, signifies how abuse can quickly lead to poverty and strain on the economy that must support them.
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