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TEEN SOUL POWER
THE NEW HEROIN:
ADDICTIVE AND DEADLY !!!
Never mind the Heroin Epidemic of the 1960s. This New Surge of Heroin Use is resulting in an Epidemic like never before seen.
Approximately 4 million people try Heroin for the first time every year, and drug overdose deaths from Heroin increased from 6% - 37% per year, since the year 2000! |
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FAST FACTS --Heroin abuse has nearly doubled in America in the last five years. The Attorney General recently called heroin use in this country an "urgent public health crisis," citing that between 2006 and 2010, heroin overdose deaths have increased by 45-percent.
--Last year, nationally, there were 47,000 deaths by overdose – for youth and adults, with most of those due to overdose of prescription pills, followed by heroin. -- Among single-substance visits, heroin accounted for 258,482 of all emergency department visits involving illicit drugs in 2011, according to the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration. (Heroin came second only to cocaine with 505,224 emergency room visits.) -- The number of deaths by heroin overdose by young adults, ages 18-24, increased 10%. |
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Heroin use is again on the rise throughout the country, and within our local communities. The number of individuals using heroin during the past 30 days more than doubled nationwide, and the percentage of high school students who reported using heroin has grown to an alarming rate. Last year, nationally, there were 47,000 deaths by overdose – for youth and adults, with most of those due to overdose of prescription pills, followed by heroin.
Heroin abuse is associated with a number of serious health conditions, including fatal overdose, spontaneous abortion, and infectious diseases like hepatitis, Sexuallt Transmitted Diesaes (STDs) and HIV/AIDs. Chronic users may develop collapsed veins, infection of the heart lining and valves, abscesses, constipation and gastrointestinal cramping, and liver or kidney disease. Pulmonary complications, including various types of pneumonia, may result from the poor health of the user as well as from heroin’s effects on breathing. In addition to the effects of the drug itself, street heroin often contains toxic contaminants or additives that can clog blood vessels leading to the lungs, liver, kidneys, or brain, causing permanent damage to vital organs. When it enters the brain, heroin is converted back into morphine, which binds to molecules on cells known as opioid receptors. These receptors are located in many areas of the brain (and in the body), especially those involved in the perception of pain and in reward. Opioid receptors are also located in the brain stem, which controls automatic processes critical for life, such as blood pressure, arousal, and respiration. Heroin overdoses frequently involve a suppression of breathing. This can affect the amount of oxygen that reaches the brain, a condition called hypoxia. Hypoxia can have short- and long-term psychological and neurological effects, including death, coma, and even permanent brain damage. Heroin is one of the strongest drugs of addiction, and chronic use of heroin leads to physical dependence, a state in which the body has adapted to the presence of the drug. If a dependent user reduces or stops use of the drug abruptly, he or she may experience severe symptoms of withdrawal. These symptoms—which can begin as early as a few hours after the last drug administration—can include restlessness, muscle and bone pain, insomnia, diarrhea and vomiting, cold flashes with goose bumps (“cold turkey”), and kicking movements (“kicking the habit”). Users also experience severe craving for the drug during withdrawal, which can precipitate continued abuse and/or relapse. Any addict will freely tell that kicking heroin is an excruciating, painful process. Besides the risk of spontaneous abortion, heroin abuse during pregnancy is also associated with low birth weight, and delays in fetal development. If the mother is regularly abusing the drug, the infant may be born physically dependent on heroin and could suffer from neonatal abstinence syndrome (NAS), a drug withdrawal syndrome in infants that requires hospitalization. |
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From 2000 through 2013, the age-adjusted rate for drug-poisoning deaths involving heroin nearly quadrupled. Most of the increase occurred after 2010.
In 2000, black persons aged 45–64 had the highest rate for drug-poisoning deaths involving heroin, but in 2013, white persons aged 18–44 had the highest rate. From 2000 through 2013, the age-adjusted rate for drug-poisoning deaths involving heroin increased for all regions of the country, with the greatest increase seen in the Midwest. |
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While the age-adjusted rate for drug-poisoning deaths involving opioid analgesics has leveled in recent years, the rate for deaths involving heroin has almost tripled since 2010.
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WARNING:
New York Times:
The flood of heroin coming into
and going out of New York City
has surged to the highest levels in
more than two decades, alarming
law enforcement officials who say
that bigger players are now
entering the market to sell the
drug here, and to feed a growing
appetite along the East Coast.
New York Times:
The flood of heroin coming into
and going out of New York City
has surged to the highest levels in
more than two decades, alarming
law enforcement officials who say
that bigger players are now
entering the market to sell the
drug here, and to feed a growing
appetite along the East Coast.
FENTANYL
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Fentanyl (brand names Sublimaze, Actiq, Durogesic, Fentora, Matrifen, Haldid, Onsolis, Instanyl, Lazanda, and others) is a potent, synthetic opioid analgesic with a rapid onset and short duration of action. Historically, it has been used to treat breakthrough pain and is commonly used in pre-procedures as a pain reliever as well as an anesthetic. Fentanyl is approximately 80-to-100 times more potent than morphine, AND roughly 30-to-50 times more potent than heroin. As a synthetic opioid, it can be made by a chemist or in a lab, and there are synthetic variations that are perhaps hundreds more times as powerful. Fentanyl depresses the nervous and respiratory systems, and exposure includes disorientation, coughing, sedation, respiratory distress or cardiac arrest. It can be absorbed right through the skin, and has been labeled "a toxicologist's worse nightmare!"
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Heroin bundles usually made up of 10 baggies wound together with a rubber band are seen in this police evidence package. The DEA cautions that today, heroin is often spiked with the powerful narcotic fentanyl making it much more dangerous, much more addictive, and much more deadly.
A surge in overdose deaths around the country from heroin laced with the powerful narcotic drug fentanyl prompted the Drug Enforcement Administration to issue a nationwide alert: "Drug incidents and overdoses related to fentanyl are occurring at an alarming rate," DEA Administrator Michele Leonhart said. She called it a "significant threat to public health and safety….. These drugs, opioids and opiates, are killing people, especially when you're buying them off the street. You don't know what you're getting… if you do drugs, you're taking a gamble." |
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Editor's Note: Heroin addiction is one of the most powerful addictions, yet one with less than successful treatment outsomes. That is why even seasoned drug users would always avoid narcotics to begin with. This newest batch of heroin is so powerful, that addicts are frustrating the treatment system. The arena of detoxification, outpatient, inpatient, residential and medication treatments are overwhelmed -- and too many people are failing out of the treatment system and back into active addiction. Besides, only 1-in-10 addicts who need treatment even seek it. The host of family, medical illnesses, mental and emotional problems, social diseases (STDs and AIDs), economic problems, and family problems are simply overwhelming for both the individual and the community. |
Heroin Addiction usually ends in one-of-three ways:
in and out of jail and prison;
in and out of hospitals and psychiatric centers,
or dead.
A SPECIAL MESSAGE - FROM A RECOVERING ADDICT
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DEAR HEROIN, This is the hardest decision I’ve ever had to make, but I can’t let you destroy me and all of the people who care about me any longer. Throughout the past year, I slowly grew attached to you…. and before I knew it, you were controlling my thoughts, words and actions. I depended on you to make me happy and take all of my sorrow and troubles away while I enjoyed the “Alice-in-Wonderland” fantasy I was in. You gave me an incredible rush that made me feel untouchable and unstoppable. What I never realized was that you not only changed how I felt, but you were responsible for the way I acted. You had a tight grip on me, and I never noticed it until I was doing things I wouldn’t normally do, just to get you. You were the only thing I needed… nothing else mattered. I can remember a couple of times when I drove to the city at 5:00 in the morning, so I could feel good when I went to school. The only times I would stay in school was when I was high. If I wasn’t, I would leave school because I would become so anxious, irritated and physically sick. I never noticed that people in school actually cared… I always thought they were out to get me and make me miserable. I never told anyone that I was experimenting with you, but everyone found out, because that is a hard thing to keep hidden. You didn’t only change my attitude, but you also destroyed me on the outside. When I didn’t have you, my body felt like it got hit by a train… every bone in my body ached. When I thought about how much I wanted you, I got the shakes… but the moment I had you again, the pain was gone instantly. You not only made my body numb, but my feelings, head and heart. Before I was introduced to you…. I was in a relationship that I thought would last forever. I am very young, but I loved and adored him so much and I would do anything for him, but I just could not give you up for him. I wanted so bad, but you wouldn’t let me. No one could take you away from me. You made me betray and disappoint everyone that I cared about, including my family. I took things from them that cannot be replaced. I got what I deserved for letting you into my life. I’ve spent 40 days in jail so far, but now I see that it’s possible to live without you. I still think about you everyday. Sometimes I think about how much I miss you, but most of the time I think about how much I hate you for destroying me and every relationship I had with the people I love. I have always looked forward to graduating from high school, but you ruined that for me too. You didn’t benefit me in any way, and if I continue to live my life with you, you’ll either put me in prison or kill me. I congratulate you on succeeding at ruining many things for me… but I can’t let that make me give up. In the long-run, you lose. I’m taking myself back from you. I’m happier in jail without you than I was on the outside with you. With that said, I’m saying good-bye to you and the zombie you made me. I’m starting a new life… the life I should be living. -- G.R. Editor’s Note: G.R., a local teenager in a local community, worked hard and received her GED while in jail and then successfully completed an in-patient treatment program. Currently she is living in a half-way house, attending college, and is doing very well and enjoying life, clean and sober. |
