Heroin is a powerful, addictive pain-killing drug. It is one of the most-used, most-rapidly acting, and most addictive of the opiate family, which includes opium, morphine, and codeine.

All opiates are derived from opium, a naturally occurring juice extracted from the seed pod of certain varieties of poppy (Papaver somniferum and Papaver setigerum). Heroin or 'diacetylmorphine' is a semi-synthetic derivative of morphine.

Heroin is increasingly used in clubland as a chill-out drug and has also recently become popular on the gay scene. It's relatively cheap and many smoke it to ease comedown from E, speed or coke.

The price of heroin varies according to how much is available. Generally it's between £40-£60 per gram, or around £15 for a third of a gram.

Heroin is a class A illegal substance in the UK, schedule I in the US.

top

appearance
Pure heroin is a white powder with a bitter taste. Street heroin comes in granule, powder, solution or pill forms and varies in colour from white to dark brown thanks to additives or impurities left from the manufacturing process.

Heroin in the UK often resembles packet chicken soup. In fact, strictly speaking, it isn't heroin at all - true heroin is a hydrochloride salt, soluble in water. The brown sold in the UK is diamorphine base - a product intended mainly for smoking, and is not soluble in water.

top

injecting
Most regular users inject either intravenously (into a vein) or intra-muscularly (into a muscle, usually the shoulder) after heating heroin powder in a little water.

The brown heroin that dominates the UK and Dutch - market is insoluble in water and must be dissolved in acid, usually citric acid from lemons.

snorting / smoking
However, an increasing number of people choose to smoke or snort lines of heroin, rather than inject.

When smoked, heroin is heated on foil and the vapour inhaled through a tube or rolled-up bank note. This is known as 'chasing the dragon'.