Essay on heroin

Heroin, a powerful narcotic, acts upon the brain as a painkiller, increasing physical addiction and ongoing emotional dependence (Schaffer Library of…). Heroin has many challenging and highly risky effects on the user, all the more hazardous if overdosing is present. This extremely dangerous drug, heroin, will never cease being used, but may cease the existence of an individual.

Multiple effects can be observed from morphine, depending upon the dosage. Morphine can also produce drowsiness, cause constipation, and, depending upon the amount taken, depress breathing. Psychological effects include euphoria--an enriched sense of well-being and living--and disconnectedness. Disconnectedness normally makes a person feel as though they are one isolated being even when amongst a group of people. Physiological effects are also present, and include a low heart rate, and reduced reflexes. Low heart rate is probably one of the biggest factors for certain patients with diseases that already affect their blood pressure. These patients are faced with the decision of pain management with morphine and abnormally low blood pressure.

In the United States alone, there are 1.2 million people who are using heroin. 600,000 of those users are addicted to heroin and use 150 to 250 milligrams on a daily basis. 700,000 Americans are needing treatment but are not receiving it. Heroin is more deadly than car accidents. From 2001 to 2014 there was a five-hundred percent increase in the total number of deaths. Although injection of the drug has declined, smoking has increased because the cost of clean needles has gone up and to newer users it is easier. While the popularity of Heroin in the United States of America has grown, Florida and California have the most heroin seized by law enforcement. Diacetylmorphine was first synthesized in 1874 by C. R. Wright. an English chemist working at St. Mary 's Hospital Medical School in London. He had been experimenting with combining morphine with various acids and sent it off to be analyzed.

So how do opioids work and what makes them so addictive? We all have millions of pain receptors throughout our body called nociceptors that send information about pain to our brains. These pain receptors are on our skin, within our organs, and our spinal cord. Opioids are given for pain because they block the signals from the nociceptors to our brain. In addition to this, opioids cause a sense of euphoria which is the “high” that accompanies the medication (Healthcare Triage, 2016). Our bodies actually produce their own opioid chemicals that many people know of as endorphins. However, long-term use of opioids can make the body stop producing endorphins which can lead to dependence on medications (National Institute on Drug Abuse, 2014). The way people take or abuse these drugs varies as well. Opioid pills such as hydrocodone or oxycodone are taken by mouth while heroin is typically injected. However, people that abuse the drugs are now crushing the pills to snort or inject which increases the intensity of the “high.” This method is also more dangerous because the risk of respiratory

For more than 30 years methadone has been used to treat addiction to heroin and other opioid drugs, including morphine. Like other narcotics, heroin releases dopamine into the bloodstream which activates the brain’s pleasure receptors producing a state of high euphoria. To maintain the same level of pleasure, heroin addicts must take increasing amounts of the drug to maintain a continuous supply of opioid to brain receptors. This produces extreme swings in mood and behavior as the drug peaks and ebbs in the bloodstream.

“Heroin has analgesic and euphoric properties” (Abadinsky, 2014, p. 45). When the drug is taken and enters the body, heroin relieves pain, works as a sedative, decreases one’s anxiety, relaxes muscles, slows motor activity, drowsiness, and a feel of well being (Abadinsky, 2014). When taken, heroin will typically start to work within ten seconds, depending the method used to ingest the drug (Abadinsky, 2014). Most users will take a needle full of heroin after he or she cooked the powder into a liquid, and injected through the skin into a vein (Abadinsky, 2014). Heroin can also be smoked by inhaling the fumes like when marijuana is smoked (Abadinsky, 2014). There are four different stages that can occur when a person uses heroin, including the rush, the high, the nod, and being straight (Abadinsky, 2014). The rush is when the user experiences multiple types of euphoric feelings, instinctive sensations, a flushed face, and deeper vocals (Abadinsky, 2014). “Heroin activates brain systems that are responsible for reinforcing peoperties of such natural rewards as food and sex” (Abadinsky, 2014, p. 45). The high is a feeling of well-being that can last for hours, but the high can be less effective depending on the user’s tolerance to the drug (Abadinsky, 2014). Therefore, if a user has a high tolerance to the high, he or she must increase dose size in order to experience the effects of the high (Abadinsky,

Heroin is a white or brown powder. Sometimes it’s a black paste that's known as black tar heroin. Heroin is wicked by many other drugs, sugar, flour and milk. It may have a vinegar smell to it. People who do heroin usually snort or smoke it. There is also an option to inject the drug into your body. It costs $70 to $300 a gram. “In the brain, heroin is converted into morphine, which binds to opioid receptors. This causes a pleasurable "rush," and a user's skin becomes warm and flushed. The user's arms and legs may feel heavy. Some users experience severe itching and vomiting. After the rush, a user's heart rate and breathing slow down, sometimes to the point of death. Heroin is considered highly addictive. Euphoria occurs within seconds of an intravenous injection, five

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

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

a so- called "junkie" if you use it. It affects the hygiene and personal appearance of the user a great deal, because nothing is as important to the user anymore as where that next hit will come from. Heroin is injected and sometimes snorted. It causes great euphoria, but also nausea and

Heroin is one of many opioid drugs used for its euphoric effects. When doctors or other medical professions use it, it is mostly used as a pain medication. It is usually given to people who would be taking it for a long period of time and is commonly used with counseling. While in most cases it is injected into the vein, usually in the arm, it can also be inhaled or smoked too. While first taking this drug, you will quickly feel it’s effects and they can usually last a few hours, depending on the amount.

These neurotransmitters attach to the receptacles in the brain and body. They regulate hormone release, pain and the feeling of well-being. When heroin enters the body it attached itself to these receptacles and dorphine is produced in larger than normal quantities, resulting in a euphoric high. Heroin can enter the body by three different ways orally to include smoking, snorting or injection . Injection into a vein or muscle remains the choice of addicts since it is able to cross the blood barrier quickly and enter the brain.

Best Answer: Heroin is a highly addictive opiate which is derived from the opium poppy. The method used to milk the poppy is to take a razor blade and cut vertical slits on the poppy bulb and to collect the milky white opiate liquid. It is the greatest cash crop of Afghanistan. The liquid is then refined into pure heroin powder and is shipped in one kilo "bricks" and smuggled into consuming countries. The bricks are diluted into about a 2% heroin solution for street sale. Heroin is a depressent and affects the primitive part of the human brain which controls the involuntary responses such as respiration and breathing. Heroin powder is heated in a spoon and melted into a liquid and injected directly into a vein usually along the inner elbow

Heroin is an opioid drug that is manufactured from morphine. The heroin is extracted from the Asian opium poppy plant. It is believed that 24 percent of people who use heroin become addicted (dependency on a substance) and they cannot stop using it without adverse affects either psychologically or physiologically.