Despite increased precautions and growing amounts of information, thousands of people continue to die from this condition, more than 52,000 in the United States in 2015 alone. Is the condition, cancer, diabetes, or heart disease?
No. Thousands of people die from those conditions, but we’re talking here about other, more preventable deaths. We’re talking about drug overdoses. In the United States, drugs in the opiate/opioid category killed more than 33,000 just in 2015. Opioids include heroin, OxyContin (oxycodone), Vicodin, Norco, codeine, morphine, fentanyl, and other drugs related to opium.
People use opioids to feel high, to feel disconnected, to escape the problems in their lives (problems that are, not surprisingly, often related to this same very same drug use). They also use them to relieve pain. In fact, except for heroin, most opioids are prescription medications for pain.
But heroin and legal opioids such as codeine are closely connected. Many times, doctors prescribe powerful opioids to relieve their patients’ pain. But addition to being powerful painkilling tools, opioids are also powerfully addictive.
A person might only use an opiate/opioid a few times before becoming hooked. Prescriptions only last for a finite amount of time, however. Even though the drugs (and access to drugs) might last a short time, they users’ addictions may not.
These addicted users might turn to stealing medications from others or buying them on the street, often paying inflated prices. These users might also turn to heroin. Heroin is chemically similar to prescription opioids (and produces similar effects), but heroin is cheaper and easier to obtain, no prescription required.
So, a person who suffers an injury or undergoes surgery might transition from using prescription medications to abusing heroin. Since so many people use painkilling drugs, become addicted to them, and turn to heroin as a replacement, it’s easy to see why so many people abuse heroin. It’s also easy to see why these addicted individuals are such a varied group of people, a group of people that need compassion and help, not stigmatization and labels that can drive them away from much-needed treatment.
