The problem of the narcotic addiction has been so important in Health Service and Psychiatric aspect in Korea that the author has studied its origin, historical background and socio-psychiatric significance.
1. Presumably, it was after the Opium War that the narcotics were for the first time introduced into Korea. It was about 120 years ago that the Opium was introduced to this country via north-western province from north China and Manchuria. Soon after, the Heroin was imported through the similar route, whereas the Morphine was brought and spread by foreign missionaries and physicians via Mokpo and Kunsan, the open ports of the south western province at that time.
2. In the socio-cultural viewpoint, the narcotic addiction in Korea is colsely related as in other countries, with various sociopolitical conditions such as alteration of political system, wars, disasters, epidemic diseases and national sufferings by foreign countries.
3. Sociopsychiatrically, it may be considered that the internalized moral and social value in Korean nationalism, which has been affected by influences of several centuries of the Confucianism in Rhee-Dynasty and of the Christianity introduced later, has acted prohibitively to "racial ego" so that the spread of the narcotic addiction in Korea has been less serious than these in other Asian Countries e,g, China, India etc.
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