Homework Help: Health: Substance Abuse: Heroin

Heroin is an illegal narcotic that is derived from morphine. Morphine is a naturally occurring substance extracted from the seedpod of the Asian poppy plant. A narcotic is any number of substances that have a depressant effect on the body. Heroin is one of the chief narcotic drugs, along with morphine and codeine. Heroin is a highly addictive drug. The abuse of heroin is a serious problem in the United States. Some street names for heroin are "smack", "H", and "junk". Heroin is normally sold on the streets as a white or brownish powder or a black sticky substance known as "black tar heroin".

Heroin can be injected, smoked, or snorted. Injection is a form of low-purity heroin, and the other ones are high-purity. Because of higher availability of the high-purity types of heroin and the fear of contracting disease through sharing needles, injection of heroin has become less common. Also, users that smoke or snort heroin believe that this is less addictive than injection is.

Heroin is known as a club drug, meaning that it is popular among teens and young adults at dance clubs and raves. As of 2001, about 3.1 million (1.4 percent) of Americans aged 12 and over have at least tried heroin once in their lifetime, about .2 percent had used heroin in the last year, and about .1 percent had used heroin in the last month. 3.1 percent of high school students have used heroin at least once.

One cause of heroin use is stress. According to a recent study conducted by the New York Academy of Medicine, there has been a significant rise in alcohol and drug use in the residents of Manhattan since the attacks on the World Trade Center. Of the approximate 1,000 individuals interviewed, about 4.4 percent used marijuana and other drugs before the attacks and about 5.7 percent used drugs after the attacks. The National Institute of Drug Abuse and the United Way, who funded this study, hoped that the results will help enable the public to advance substance abuse prevention and treatments for coping with severe stress.

One of the long-term effects of heroin use is addiction. Some chronic users of heroin may develop collapsed veins, liver disease, and abscesses. Even after a few hours of the last heroin use, withdrawal may occur. Effects of withdrawal are drug craving, restlessness, and vomiting.

Heroin is dangerous because most of its users don't know the actual strength of the drug, they are at high risk for an overdose. A heroin overdose causes slow breathing and maybe even death. By injecting needles, heroin users are putting themselves at higher risk for HIV, hepatitis B and C, and other blood diseases.

There are treatments for heroin addiction. There are medicines ,such as methadone, that can be taken once a day and used in place of heroin until the person is completely free of heroin cravings. There is also Narcotics Anonymous, which involves twelve steps that help narcotic users to become drug-free. Currently, there are about 600,000 heroin addicts in the United States that need help.

Homework Help: Health: Substance Abuse

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