What are the effects of heroin?
Short term effects are felt almost immediately depending on how you take the drug. If it is taken intravenously the effects are felt within eight to ten seconds. The heart and breathing rate slows down and the user feels relaxed. Pain is reduced; the user experiences a brief euphoria or “high”, and then becomes drowsy, feeling as if all their worries and troubles are disappearing. The short term problems are hypothermia, nausea, reduced breathing and death from an overdose. Overdose is common as most of heroin sold on the street is not pure, and is usually mixed with aforementioned foreign substances such as chalk, dust, baking soda, powdered milk and local anaesthetics.
There are many long term effects from heroin use. One of these is tolerance: where the user gets used to the high from a certain dosage and needs to take more and more of the drug. Large quantities of the drug cost more, meaning the user has to steal to feed their addiction. Female addicts may even be driven to solicitation to pay for the drug - a clear sign of the many problems to society caused by heroin addiction. There becomes a psychological and physiological need for heroin. People begin to crave the drug four to six hours after their last injection.
Heroin addiction may bring about a number of physical problems. These include collapsing of veins - resulting in the user injecting into the leg or stomach - and liver disease as it is unable to cope with large amounts of a dangerous substance such as heroin. Withdrawal symptoms also occur.
Withdrawal from heroin
When a heroin user is withdrawing from heroin use, they suffer from a number of protracted symptoms, usually lasting between one and ten weeks. Within about eight to ten hours after their last ‘hit‘, the user’s eyes begin to water, they yawn, and they feel anxious and irritable. Excessive sweating, fever, stomach and muscle cramps, diarrhoea and chills can follow several hours later. These withdrawal symptoms can continue from one to three days after the last ‘fix.’
The risks from heroin use
A person is at risk of a number of problems when they take heroin…
- Deaths from an overdose. The risk increases over a period of constant use, as tolerance increases.
- Overdoses can lead to coma and even death from respiratory failure, as breathing slows down dramatically.
- If heroin is taken with other drugs, including alcohol, overdose is more likely. Other downers such as benzodiazepine tranquillisers are also associated with heroin overdose deaths.
- A risk of death due to inhaling vomit is possible as heroin stops the body's cough reflex working properly.
- Injecting heroin can do damage to the user’s veins and has been known to lead to gangrene (death and decay of body tissue, usually a digit or a limb), and tissue infections.
- The risks of sharing needles to inject are well-known, putting the user in danger of infections like hepatitis B or C and HIV/AIDS.
Cost
Prices can vary from region to region. A ‘first hit’ is offered for a price of just £2. A ‘score’ of the drug is enough to satisfy a user in the early stages of addiction, costing £20 a bag as indicated by the name. As tolerance increases more of the drug is in demand, costing a great deal of money, possibly up to £200 a day. Regional suppliers can make a profit of £2,000 a day, and local dealers up to £12,000 a week.
Chances of getting hooked
Heroin is highly addictive. Over time, effects of heroin on the brain cause 'craving' and a strong psychological desire to keep on using. Also, tolerance builds, and the desired effects reduce so much that users have to take more just to get the same effects and even more just to feel 'normal' or to avoid a very unpleasant withdrawal state.
Drugs have been developed to help treat heroin addiction. These include opiate substitutes for heroin such as methadone and subutex, and also drugs like naltrexone that block the effects of heroin so you can't get a high once you have become drug-free. Methadone is a heroin replacement available for prescription from a normal pharmacy. Studies have shown that the effectiveness of these drugs depends on the person, and the level of addiction.
Studies have shown that heroin addiction is reaching people as young as ten years old. Heroin use and addiction fell during the 1980’s and 1990’s, but has seen a dramatic rise over the last decade.
