Fighting The War On Heroin

Heroin is a painkilling drug that is made from the Papaverum Somniferum, also known as the opium poppy plant. All opiates are addictive painkillers. Heroin starts as a milky sap of the opium poppy. The sap is then dried and becomes a gum. After washing the gum, it becomes opium. Morphine and codeine are two painkilling alkaloids that

The American “War on Drugs” war created to keep an exorbitant amount of people behind bars, and in a subservient status. First, America has a storied history when it comes to marijuana use. However, within the last 50 years legislation pertaining to drug use and punishment has increased significantly. In the modern era, especially hard times have hit minority communities thanks to these drug laws. While being unfairly targeted by drug laws and law enforcement, minorities in America are having a difficult time trying to be productive members of society.

There is no cookie cutter heroin user. In fact, many of heroin’s newest addicts are in their teens or early 20s; many also come from middle- or upper-middle-class suburban families. Heroin is a dangerous drug that has many different “street names” such as Smack, Mud, Dope, Dragon, and Junk. The scientific names are diacetylmorphine or morphine diacetate, also known as diamorphine.

In the past forty years, the United States has spent over $2.5 trillion dollars funding enforcement and prevention in the fight against drug use in America (Suddath). Despite the efforts made towards cracking down on drug smugglers, growers, and suppliers, statistics show that addiction rates have remained unchanged and the number of people using illegal drugs is increasing daily (Sledge). Regardless of attempts to stem the supply of drugs, the measure and quality of drugs goes up while the price goes down (Koebler). Now with the world’s highest incarceration rates and greatest illegal drug consumption (Sledge), the United States proves that the “war on drugs” is a war that is not being won.

Heroin was initially created by Charles Wright in 1874 to combat Morphine addiction amongst Civil War soldiers. The commercial production of heroin began in 1898, by the Bayer Pharmaceutical Company, and their “sales pitch” persuaded people that Heroin was a “safe, non-addictive” substitute for morphine, therefore, gaining popularity amongst healthcare professionals and their morphine addicted patients. As a result, numerous

The media portrays opioid abuse as a new dilemma, but it actually extends as far back as 1898 when Bayer Co. produced heroin, a drug made from opium, and commercialized it to be a “wonder drug” for those in need of pain relief (Moghe 2016). Today, heroin is known to be a dangerous, illegal, and addictive drug. Before doctors

Since the early times, opiates, heroin, and other drugs have been used in providing analgesia as well as substitutes to reach a place of euphoria. Originally, as Yurgelum-Todd et al (2009) has noted, derived from the opium poppy, heroin has been used as an alternative to morphine in dealing with addiction (Yurgelum-Todd, p. 175, 2009). Unfortunately, over the years it has consistently become prevalent that heroin has more negative aspects than anything; heroin is highly addictive, resulting in consequences such as overdoses, infections, violence and crime, deficits in memory, learning, and

Heroin is named after the German word for hero, heroisch. It was first made by C. R. Alder Wright in 1874 by adding two acetyl groups to the molecule morphine, a natural product of the opium poppy. Heroin is an illegal, highly addictive drug. It is both the most abused and the most rapidly acting of the opiates, about two to four times more potent than morphine and is faster in its onset of action. It is processed from morphine which is a naturally occurring substance extracted from the seed pod of certain varieties of poppy plants. It is typically sold as a white or brownish powder or as the black sticky

The heroin epidemic’s impact on this nation has demanded action to be taken. Currently, the United States is placing an emphasis on stopping doctors from unnecessarily prescribing opiates such as Vicodin, Percocet, and OxyContin to patients because it often leads to heroin addiction. Furthermore, the country is beginning to focus its efforts on “harm reduction,” which is “a set of practical strategies and ideas aimed at reducing negative consequences associated with [heroin] use” (SouthComm Business Media LLC, 2015, para 12). One form of harm reduction is giving users clean needles at no cost. Offering help to addicts when they come for free needles will increase their chances of recovery, and clean needles prevent the spread of deadly diseases such as HIV and Hepatitis C. SouthComm Business Media LLC (2015) further notes, “…it costs only a dime for a needle versus $90,000 for three months of hepatitis c treatments” (para 14). Another form of harm reduction being used to combat heroin is the use of Naloxone, which reverses the effects of an overdose. Many police officers, medical personnel, family members of heroin addicts, and heroin addicts themselves carry Naloxone with them in case of an overdose. Finally, Suboxone treatment is considered as one of the more effective ways to reduce harm. Suboxone is a drug that blocks the user from getting high and makes it to where they do not crave the drug (SouthComm Business Media LLC, 2015, para 24). Stopping the

Heroin was first produced in 1898 in Germany, by Bayer Pharmaceutical Company as a substitute for morphine.6 It was marketed as a non-addictive miracle drug, to use as a cough syrup and pain reliever, but 12 years later it was discovered that heroin was about two times as potent as morphine.5-6 Today, we know heroin as a highly addictive narcotic which has played its part in the worst opioid crisis in the history of British Colombia.2 Heroin is an opioid made from the resin of poppy plants which contain morphine.1 The drug itself can be a white or brown powder or a black goo.1 It is commonly mixed with water and injected with a needle right into the body, but can also be smoked or snorted up the nose.1,3 These methods send it very quickly to

Opium is used to create morphine, a drug that is highly addictive and used to treat chronic pain in terminally ill patients as well as other medical conditions. Heroin, an illegal and highly dangerous drug, is made from morphine. “Heroin can be a white or brown powder, or a black sticky substance known as black tar heroin.” (NIDA 2017)) Other synthetic opioids that are just as addictive are prescription pain kills such as Oxycotin and Vicodin.

Heroin is a highly addictive illegal drug that kills users and destroys lives. It is tearing apart communities, ripping up families and ruining millions of lives. About 4.2 million Americans around the age of 12 or older have tried heroin at least once while some have become addicted for life. Heroin is the most dangerous drug in America today because of its harmful effects, widespread use, easily availability, low cost and the high that comes with using this drug.

Heroin is an opiate, and is a product that is extracted from the Poppy plant and synthesized from morphine. It is a white-to-dark brown powder or tar-like substance and is highly addictive because its qualities become lesser as use progresses, causing the receiver to need more of the drug to achieve the result of the pain relief. Heroin

Heroin addicts have the psychological dependence on heroin that leads them into the state of self-destruction and the possibility of leading to death by the extreme use of heroin. Never estimate the poppy flower for its power that withholds the fiends to their mentality enduring the euphoria enslavement of the mind that contained for many centuries. The heroin addiction nation is a self numbing injection and dry approach to have the mind under the state of the greatest feeling of great happiness leaving the pain behind under the spell of heroin. Heroin comes in many forms for addicts to enjoy in their own way. They come in powder and rock like form that is combined with other narcotics. The snorting form for heroin is not

The focus in the video Heroin and the War on Drugs, is to address the most efficient recorded path to defeat drug addiction; which is identifying drug addiction as a national health issue. With drug addiction being directly related to crime, former president Nixon first approached the drug epidemic with tough penalties that resulted in no documented reduction change and resources being wasted. After, different approaches were being tested such as methadone; resulting in “overdose deaths went from 70 deaths a year to 4. The crime rate at a monthly bases was cut in half in that period of time.” stated L. DuPont. Next approach that was tested was clean needle exchange which produced “Baltimore’s HIV rate plummeted.”. Although, the video stated