Heroin: Fast Lane to Nowhere
By Keri Collins Lewis
What do legendary rocker Janis Joplin and 1950s doo-wop singer Frankie Lymon have in common? How is John Belushi of the Blues Brothers similar to Red Hot Chili Peppers musician Hillel Slovak? Death by heroin.
“I’ve never met anyone who thought they’d become an addict,” says Dr. Herbert Kleber, professor of psychiatry and director of the division of Substance Abuse, College of Physicians and Surgeons, Columbia University. “As time goes on, users need to take increasing amounts just to keep from getting sick, so they keep going back for more and more.”
How can something that makes the user feel so happy be so dangerous?
Acceleration: Zero to High in Moments
Just like a Formula 1 race car can go from zero to 186 miles per hour in 8.6 seconds, heroin users experience rapid results when they inject, snort/sniff, or smoke the drug. Heroin is made from morphine, which is a naturally occurring substance extracted from the seed pod of the opium poppy plant.
“Pure heroin is an odorless white powder with a bitter taste. Street heroin, often a combination of other substances, can be found in off-white to dark-brown powder form. Black coal- or tar-colored heroin is also found in some parts of the country,” writes Bilesha Perera, Ph.D., M.S., of Indiana University. Dealers add other substances, such as sugar, starch, and powdered milk, to heroin to dilute its purity and increase their profits.
Dr. Kleber reflects, “Every dose is like a game of Russian roulette. One day you can get it at 90 percent pure, 30 the next.” Erica, who began using heroin as a teen, says, “A friend of mine died of a heroin overdose. He got a bad bag [low purity] once, then the next time he went back [to that dealer] he got three times as much, only the purity was much higher and he didn’t know it.”
Wrong Way
Heroin enters the brain quickly, going straight into the bloodstream, where it activates the “pleasure system” and “physical dependence” regions of the brain. “Our brains are wired to ensure that we will repeat life-sustaining activities by associating those activities with pleasure or reward. Whenever this reward circuit is activated, the brain notes that something important is happening that needs to be remembered, and the brain teaches us to do it again and again, without thinking about it. Because drugs of abuse stimulate the same circuit, we learn to abuse drugs in the same way,” wrote the authors of Drugs, Brains, and Behavior: The Science of Addiction. Regular users develop tolerance, which means they need a larger amount of heroin to get the same effects or intensity. This, in turn, leads to increasingly risky behavior.
Danger Zone
Dr. Karen Miotto, associate professor in the Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences at the UCLA School of Medicine, explains why heroin is highly addictive. “There is a negative and positive reinforcement with heroin addiction.
The positive reinforcement is the users’ experience while under the influence. The negative reinforcement is that once they become dependent on it, they become very sick when they stop.
“Heroin addiction is really a lifestyle. Once users cross the line (into dependency), they use the drug every day . . . and have to procure significant amounts of money to support their habit,” Miotto adds. This daily need leads many users into personal or family neglect, as well as criminal activity, on top of the fact that heroin is an illegal substance with heavy penalties for possession, including lifetime imprisonment.
Heroin changes everything. As Erica says, “Heroin is one of the things I said I wouldn’t ever do. But when it came to getting high, my morals and beliefs were out the window.” Heroin users are also at risk for HIV, the virus that causes AIDS, from sharing infected needles with other addicts.
Dead End
The best way to avoid crashing and burning is to stay away from heroin in the first place—it’s a fast lane leading nowhere. To learn more about heroin, go to http://www.drugabuse.gov.
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