Effects of Substance Abuse on Prisoners in Texas - Assignment Example

? Effects of substance abuse on prisoners in Austin, Texas Substance abuse in Texas has been on the rise in the recent past. The detrimental impacts that substance abuse has on victims cannot be underestimated since they present challenges to the victims and other stakeholders such as the society and correctional institutions. The high incidences of substance abuse in correctional facilities have led to questions raised about the effectiveness of criminal justice systems in Austin, Texas. The high numbers of prisoners in Texas and the increasing cases of substance and sexual abuse are major causes for concern. The rate of substance abuse in prisons has increased leading to detrimental health effects and even death in extreme cases. Since substance abuse is not a new concept in the prisons, there is need for close attention to avert negative effects. The study focuses on impacts of substance abuse to prisoners and the society. A major focus was on establishing reasons behind the high incidences of substance abuse in the correctional facilities. Through the study, negative impacts of substance abuse on prisoners and the community as well as other stakeholders would be determined. The effectiveness of mechanisms put in place to treat substance abuse and rehabilitate victims is examined. This would help in identification of loopholes, which result in negative outcomes. Introduction There has been a steady rise of substance abuse in prisons in Austin, Texas. Substance abuse is the harmful and use of substances for purposes of altering the normal mental state of an individual. Although treatment and other mechanisms have effected to address the issue of substance abuse, little progress has been made. There are a number of factors associated with substance abuse in prisons with correlation observed between crime and substance abuse. A study of factors that lead to the rising trend of substance abuse would go a long way in helping minimize effects and evaluate the involvement of other stakeholders (Ireland et al., 2010). Stakeholders and interest groups Stakeholders involved in the substance abuse can be used to achieve maximum outcomes even with the limited resources. The center that deals with substance abuse outlines stakeholders and their role in managing substance abuse in prisons as well as their relationship to the treatment process. There should enhanced collaborative efforts and partnerships between key stakeholders. The system of criminal justice and substance abuse management community can and should work together for the common good of everyone involved (Neubauer, 2011). The possible contribution from major stakeholders can be immense and may lead to highly desirable outcomes. The center for substance abuse treatment, divides stakeholders into five primary categories. First, there are community stakeholders who include the public, the media, victims, legislators, businesses and community organizations. Second, are those stakeholders associated with offenders in one way or another? They include the offender, employers, family members, and providers of social services. The third set of stakeholders is those found within the system of criminal justice and they include prosecutors, police officers, and judges, attorneys for the defense, as well as parole and probation officers. Fourth are the stakeholders within the system of public health who include providers of mental health services as well as healthcare organizations. The fifth category is for stakeholders within the system of alcohol and other substance treatment. All the stakeholders contribute significantly to management of substance abuse in prisons which would lead to the common good of everyone involved. The enhanced collaboration and partnership among all stakeholders would result in higher probabilities of ex-offenders succeeding in the streets and communities that are safer for everyone. Products of such cooperation and collaborations focus on coming up with a comprehensive system to promoting, extending, and expanding the continuum of drug abuse treatment as well as care for offenders under the supervision of policies that have been put in place. This requires participation of several stakeholders draw from fields concerned with substance abuse in prisons. The policies aim at providing strategic direction while being flexible and ready to accommodate new challenges that may come up and capitalize on opportunities that present. Most significantly, implementation of good policies would go a long way in improving the system of service delivery and would act as a catalyst to promote the partnerships of all stakeholders involved. In most instances when substance abusers are released, there detrimental effects on their health which affects their economic and social well-being. Research has proven that majorities of prisoners who come back to prison use drugs or consume alcohol before incarceration. When most of the substance abusers return to the community, they do not get health services, which are a major contributing factor to instability making the users to involve themselves in criminal activities, which lead to their re-arrest. Families of substance abusers are affected economically and emotionally in their effort to support victims who are their relatives and friends. Because of several substance abuse in prisons, there is need is need for intervention from all stakeholders to fight drug abuse in prisons. Even though there are policies and programs established by Texas’ criminal justice system to handle substance abusers, the policies and programs appear to be insufficient. This is evidenced by the number of cases that have shown no signs of reducing in the recent past. Social, political, or personal factors There are significant individual variations in substance use and abuse. Some individuals never use drugs even though the substances nay be readily available to them. Other people use drugs regularly or sporadically for many years but never escalate the use to complete substance dependence. Some people become compulsive chronic users and they often have difficulties doing without drugs. The individual differences could be a result of a combination of several factors that such social, political, economic, environmental, and genetic among others. Environmental factors include individual experiences, such as conditions in the family and the society as well as many more condition under which a person lives. Genetic factors are those genes passed on from parents to children and that are shared, in part by other members in the family that could act as predisposing factors. Personal, social, and political factors combine resulting in risk factors that are influences, which increase the probability of an individual being involved in substance use and abuse. On the other hand, the factors may also combine to result in protective factors that are influences, which decrease chances of an individual being involved in substance use and abuse. Vulnerability of prisoners could, then, refer to the combination of a person’s risk factors as well as protective factors that make an individual to be involved in substance abuse or not. It defines the overall probability of using substances. People with more risk factors than protective factors are more likely to be involved in substance use compared to individuals with more protective factors than risk factors (Ireland et al., 2010). Patterns influencing research Substance and drug abuse among inmates in Austin is highly dangerous because of several negative effects associated with it. Substance abuse affects victims both psychologically and socially, thus, the need for research to negate those effects. The effects include mental illnesses; contraction of other diseases and in extreme cases, there can be fatalities. For some individual, there may be relapses particularly when the offenders are not treated making the offenders go back to substance use and abuse. This may lead to re-arrest as well s re-incarceration of victims, thereby straining the public health system and the criminal justice system. In the end, the effects spread from the victim to the community and institutions that must deal with the victims (Chang, 2010). Substance abuse is an ongoing contentious issue in Texas’ system of criminal justice and therefore it demands for research to inform efforts of handling victims and managing effects for the well-being of everyone involved. The study is critical bearing in mind the high and ever increasing population number in prisons in Austin, Texas. The impacts of substance abuse to prisoners come with many challenges to prisoners, their families, and the institutions concerned since they must go out of their way to support victims in correction and rehabilitation. Substance abuse cannot be ignored since when the users are affected, the effects move down to all stakeholders. The study would prove significant in addressing impacts of substance abuse on users as well as all stakeholders involved. It could be important to carry out vulnerability research, in an effort to identify risk and protective factors for both substance use and substance dependence (Frakt, 2012). The research could also help refine existing protective and risk factors through enhancing their specificity in prediction of substance abuse, increase the number of protective factors while minimizing the number of risk factors to the least number possible, and understand genetic and environmental influences that underlie protective and risk factors. Possible policy implications Drug related crimes and drug abuse impact on lives of many people. Efforts to curb crime and violence as well as improving the lives of people scarred by drugs put a lot of burden on the system for criminal justice at every level of government. To effectively address the serious implication associated with substance abuse, there should be development of partnerships between local, state and community stakeholders. The partners need to agree to combine resources and experience to aggressively fight crime and substance abuse. The shared goals include enhancing drug abuse treatment to offender, improving public safety and reducing recidivism (Stuntz, 2011). Possible policy changes include developing therapeutic programs within prison walls. In the recent past research has indicated the effectiveness of correcting substance abuse within correctional facilities. It has been found that policy changes based on a model for social learning have proven to be successful. The assumption made is that criminal acts are learnt through the continued interaction with other people in the society. Therefore pro-social acts should also be learnt by change of policy to replace deviant acts. Successful policy changes promote relationships between offenders and staff, which emphasize on and are characterized by openness in communication and trust. Successful approaches include: self-help groups, therapeutic communities, family therapy, skills and vocational training, modeling and role playing, training on interpersonal cognition, and peer monitoring of behavior. In could be effective to use ex-offenders as counselors to be viewed as credible outcomes of rehabilitation. Conclusion There are many negative effects of substance abuse among inmates to victims and to the community. Despite the several measures that have been put in place to counter the effects and treat substance abuse victims, a lot still needs to be done to ensure the trend is negated. Substance abuse victims have a right to be helped and supported by all stakeholders in treatment and rehabilitation, with the focus being on making them better people who can give a positive contribution to the community. There are treatments, policies, and programs that have had positive outcomes and it could help if they are implemented in Austin, Texas. References Chang, C. (2010). The Impact of Implementing Smoking Bans Among Incarcerated Substance Users: A Qualitative Study. . Evaluation & The Health Professions, 33(4), 473-479. Frakt, A. (2012). Under-provision of substance use treatment in prisons. The Incidental Economist, 9(8), 119. Ireland, C., Berg, B. L., & Mutchnick, R. J. (2010). Research methods for criminal justice and the social sciences: Practice and applications: Boston: Prentice Hall.  Neubauer, David W (2011). America's Courts and the Criminal Justice System. Wadsworth Cengage Learning. Belmont, CA: Stuntz, William J. (2011). The Collapse of American Criminal Justice. Mass: Belknap Press of Harvard University Press. Cambridge. Read More