What Does Heroin Look Like?
Heroin in its purest form is a fine white powder. However, it often appears rose gray, brown or black due to additives used to dilute it, like sugar or caffeine. Sometimes street heroin is cut with strychnine* or other poisons. These additives do not fully dissolve so, when injected into the body, they can clog the blood vessels that lead to the lungs, kidneys or brain. This itself can cause infection or destruction of vital organs.1
Users can never know the actual strength of the heroin they buy on the street, putting them at constant risk of an overdose.2
Heroin can be injected, smoked or snorted. Heroin may initially create a false sense of extroversion and heightened sexual performance. However, these effects fade quickly, and users often seek more of the drug, chasing a high they will never feel again.43
Heroin is highly addictive. Even using it once can cause cravings and painful withdrawal. The drug quickly breaks down the immune system. Prolonged use often brings on severe physical and mental decline and, tragically, death.5
* strychnine: a highly toxic plant-based substance used in rat poison. It can be deadly if swallowed or breathed in.
Street Names for Heroin
- Big H
- Brown Sugar
- H
- Hell Dust
- Horse
- Junk
- Nose Drops
- Skag
- Smack
- Thunder
Drugs equal death. If you do nothing to get out, you end up dying. To be a drug addict is to be imprisoned. In the beginning, you think drugs are your friend. They may seem to help you escape the things or feelings that bother you. But soon, you will find you get up in the morning thinking only about drugs.
“Your whole day is spent finding or taking drugs. You get high all afternoon. At night, you put yourself to sleep with heroin. And you live only for that. You are in a prison. You beat your head against a wall, nonstop, but you don’t get anywhere. In the end, your prison becomes your tomb.” —Sabrina
REFERENCES
- Heroin-caffeine-strychnine mixtures - Where and why?, UNODC, Bulletin on Narcotics (1975, Issue 1)
- Fentanyl DrugFacts, National Institute on Drug Abuse (NIDA)
- What is heroin and how is it used? (Heroin Research Report), National Institute on Drug Abuse (NIDA), NIH
- Premature ejaculation and other sexual dysfunctions in opiate dependent men receiving methadone substitution treatment, Addictive Behaviors (Elsevier), via University of Glasgow repository
- Do All Opioid Drugs Share the Same Immunomodulatory Properties? A Review From Animal and Human Studies, Frontiers in Immunology (peer-reviewed)
How much do you really know about heroin?
Updated:
