Nearly fourteen percent of all emergency room drug-related episodes involves heroin (www. Heroin is an opiate that is a central nervous system depressant. The majority of heroin users are under the age of twenty-six (www.nida.nih.gov). Heroin, also known as smack, hell dust, big H, drops ect., is an opium derivative that is highly addictive. It is the most abused and has the fastest effect out of all the opiates. It is produced from opium that is extracted from the poppy plant (www.whitehousedrugpolicy. In the article Getting High on Poppy Seeds it told you how to turn poppy seeds that can be bought at any grocery store, into heroin. It was so precise that it even told you to add Raspberry cordial to make it taste better (www.lycfaeum.org). Heroin is easily produced that may be one of the reasons why it has such a long history. .
It was first cultivated in Mesopotamia in 3400 B.C. The drug spread to other countries and in the 1300's it disappeared for 200 years from European historical record (www.heroinaddiction.com). In 1905 the U.S congress banned opium. In the mid to late 1800's is when opium became very popular. It was commonly used in the Civil War to treat wounded soldiers which created many addicts. Heroin was imported into the United States shortly after it was invented. Today heroin is made in South America, Mexico, South and Southwest Asia (www.usdoj.gov). .
The DSMIV calls it an addiction when "the addict has significant levels of tolerance and will experience withdrawal on abrupt discontinuation of opioid dependence includes signs and symptoms that reflect compulsive, prolonged self administration of opioid substances that are used for no legitimate medical purpose, or, if a general medical condition is present that requires opioid treatment, that are used is doses that are greatly in excess of the amount needed for pain relief. Persons with opioid dependence tend to develop such regular patterns of compulsive drug use that daily activities are typically planned around obtaining and administering opioids.