Heroin: what it is, its use and effect

Heroin – the history

Heroin has a long and interesting history. It wasn’t always a street drug and is still used in some countries for its medical properties. Heroin is derived from morphine which is a substance found in opium poppy seeds.

In 1805 a French pharmacist discovered how to isolate one of opium’s active ingredients which was morphine. Then in 1874 an English chemist Charles Wright performed experiments that involved mixing morphine with different acids.  He invented a new chemical called Diacetylmorphine also known as diamorphine or heroin.  This drug, heroin, was similar in structure to morphine but was two to three times stronger.

Where does heroin come from?

Like many other opiates, heroin comes from the opium poppy. The poppy plants are grown in Southwest Asia, Mexico and Columbia. Opium from poppy seeds contains several opioid compounds including morphine and codeine. 

Morphine is extracted from opium using diluted acid, then mixing that morphine with other acids will create heroin. Essentially, heroin is morphine with a small chemical compound added to it. Heroin can be a white or brown powder, or a black sticky substance known as black tar heroin.

Heroin was first used in America as a pain medication back in 1898. Originally, doctors used heroin in cough medicine for adults and children, as pain relief in childbirth and when surgery was performed.  It was even marketed by the pharmaceutical company Bayer as a non-addictive pain medication!!!

After about 20 years of use and misuse it became medically clear that heroin was, in fact, highly addictive and in 1924 it was made illegal by the government of the United States, and it has remained illegal ever since.

How heroin is used

Heroin can be used in different ways such as by snorting, smoking by heating the heroin on a surface such as tin foil and then inhaling the smoke and the most common being injecting. Kit Kat stopped producing the four finger bar with foil and changed the wrapper to plastic as the foil wrapper was being used by heroin addicts to smoke heroin, as it was just the right size.

At the Haynes Clinic we often hear that someone who was smoking heroin was introduced to injecting by someone else actually injecting a syringe of heroin into them. They did not inject themselves the first time but were shown how to by another user. It can also be mixed with crack or cocaine and injected; this is called snowballing. The effects of smoking the drug will last up to about an hour, whilst injecting or snorting will last longer and can be more intense.

The effects of heroin on the body

Heroin is a highly addictive drug and as the body quickly becomes tolerant to its effects so we will need to use more to get the same effect.  Therefore, our dependency on the drug strengthens. When using heroin, it enters the brain rapidly and binds to opioid receptors on cells located in many areas and in particular those receptors involved in feelings of pain and pleasure and in controlling heart rate, sleeping and breathing. 

Heroin is never “pure” and will have been mixed or cut with all sorts of different substances such as sugar, powdered milk, starch, paracetamol or dangerous substances such as fentanyl.  These additional additives are used simply for a supplier’s or dealer’s financial gain in order for a block of heroin go further. However, it is these additives that will cause blood vessels to clog up and these blood vessels will be those going to the brain, lungs, liver, and kidneys, all with the potential to cause permanent damage.

In comparison to other drugs, heroin has always been a cheap drug to purchase. For many people, with its long history of destruction of lives, and the promise of a young death, they would not even consider trying it.

The danger of using heroin

Because the strength of a batch of heroin can differ greatly it is possible to easily have an overdose where the body may not be used to the strength of a less uncut batch or an overdose due to taking it with a combination of drugs which the body can’t cope or manage.

It is a fact that known heroin users that are being released from the prison system are given training for overdose prevention and also provided with a drug called Naloxone which will counter the effects of an overdose. They would run the risk of an overdose for not having used for a long time and a relapse could prove to be fatal.

Methadone – a heroin substitute

It is very common for heroin users to get prescribed Methadone by their local drug and alcohol team. Methadone is a synthetic opioid and is meant to help people reduce their heroin use as it is prescribed as a daily substitute to buying heroin.

When it was originally introduced as a substitute prescription medication it was also thought that people would stop going out stealing from high street shops in order to fund their heroin habit.  Sadly, what happens is that they get their prescription methadone and still use heroin on top. The end result is a dependency on both methadone and heroin and a need to be detoxed off both.

Heroin addicts do not often live to old age

In the past, at the Haynes Clinic, we would certainly get old alcoholics in for residential treatment but that is not the case with heroin drug addicts.  Generally, with injecting, the individual health issues can rapidly decline and normally a heroin addict will not even reach middle age. Certainly, heroin users are generally not living in a clean and tidy environment and one of the prime health risks is sharing needles. 

When a person uses a needle to inject heroin some of their blood goes into the needle and syringe and this can lead to a transfer of that blood when needles are shared. HIV spreads through blood and if you use the same needle as someone who has the virus the HIV blood will be transferred. The local drug and alcohol team will normally have a needle exchange programme and also provide bottles of fresh water.

The police force and border force and customs have not been able to stem the flow of heroin and due to its increased availability throughout the UK over the past few years and its very cheap price, it remains a popular though highly dangerous and potentially fatal drug to take.