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Drug Cartels In Mexico

Decent Essays

The Partido Revolucionario Institucional, or PRI party governed the Mexican political environment for about 70 years before the 21st century when the right-wing Partido Acción Nacional, or PAN party established its presidency. Under the PRI political rule, drug cartels thrived and eventually became unstable. Until in December 2006, PAN party presidential representative Felipe Calderón rose to power with an established nationalistic political goal to end drug cartels. Ten days later after entering office, marked the first day of large scale operations to send troops against the narco-mafias. Subsequently, murder rates and international drug trafficking have only increased every year since then. At a projected $23 billion a year industry, the …show more content…

In the 1960’s when the United States began its war on drugs by shutting down trade with the coast guard through the Caribbean to inland Florida, Columbian cartels—the world’s major manufacturer of cocaine at the time sought out Mexican drug traffickers’ routes for easy access into America’s illicit drug marketplace. As the US and Columbian government set out to dismantling major Columbian drug cartels, Mexico’s cartels began taking up the production of cocaine and to this day, Mexico remains as the major distributor and producer of illicit drugs for the United States. A consistent demand for illicit drugs over the past decades spawning mainly from the United States has created numerous multidimensional consequences from health and physical implications (e.g. addiction, anxiety, depression) to environmental and health system instabilities (e.g. frequent deforestation and corruption) Mexico and the United States are both suffering from this insistent war on …show more content…

Kidnappings and killings are frequent in cities like Ciudad Juarez and Acapulco. A general disregard for the safety of its people is apparent as women become the targets to kidnappings, and murders occur daily. Just from 2007 to 2008, the death toll in Mexico rose by 117%. Continued militarization that the Mexican government utilizes suggests that the violent situation should be resolved. On the contrary, cities with high homicide rates only document the opposite. This environment of fear for the citizens of these cities has created new physical health problems. One such problem is the rise in ishaemic heart disease—the world’s leading cause of death. In a study completed in 2016, it was documented that there with a 1-unit increase in the recorded homicides brings about a 7% increase in the chances for IHD deaths for that same month. This study highlights the stressors of the Mexican inhabitants in remarkably dangerous

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