These are the most addictive things in world.
Heroin
Nutt et al.’s experts ranked heroin as the most addictive drug, giving it a score of 2.5 out of a maximum score of 3. Heroin is an opiate that causes the level of dopamine in the brain’s reward system to increase by up to 200% in experimental animals. In addition to being arguably the most addictive drug, heroin is dangerous, too, because the dose that can cause death is only five times greater than the dose required for a high.
Alcohol
People celebrate the opening of the 182. Oktoberfest beer festival in Munich, southern Germany.
Although legal in the US and UK, alcohol was rated as the second most addictive substance by Nutt et al.’s experts (scoring 2.2 out of a maximum of 3). Alcohol has many effects on the brain, but in laboratory experiments on animals it increased dopamine levels in the brain’s reward system by 40-360% – and the more the animals drank the more dopamine levels increased.
Cocaine
Cocaine directly interferes with the brain’s use of dopamine to convey messages from one neuron to another. In essence, cocaine prevents neurons from turning the dopamine signal off, resulting in an abnormal activation of the brain’s reward pathways. In experiments on animals, cocaine caused dopamine levels to rise more than three times the normal level. It is estimated that between 14-20m people worldwide use cocaine and that in 2009 the cocaine market was worth about $75 billion.
Barbiturates (‘downers’)
Barbiturates, also known as blue bullets, gorillas, nembies, barbs and pink ladies are a class of drugs that were initially used to treat anxiety and to induce sleep. They interfere with chemical signaling in the brain, the effect of which is to shut down various brain regions. At low doses, barbiturates cause euphoria, but at higher doses they can be lethal because they suppress breathing.
Nicotine
Nicotine is the main addictive ingredient of tobacco. When somebody smokes a cigarette, nicotine is rapidly absorbed by the lungs and delivered to the brain. While Nutt et al’s expert panels rated nicotine (tobacco) as only the 12th most addictive substance, there are reasons to believe that nicotine is a very powerful addictive drug.
In 2002 the WHO estimated there were more than 1 billion smokers and it has been estimated that tobacco will kill more than 8m people annually by 2030
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