Heroin, a slave master that kills

Heroin addicts describe their first high as the ultimate escape, a 20-hour fix starting with a pleasure rush that races from the tip of the tongue throughout the body and steadily progresses toward hallucinations that transfix a user in a state of semiconscious euphoria.

Coming down, though, is hard to do.

Heroin works by overstimulating the brain, causing a cascade of the pleasure-producing neurotransmitter dopamine to wash over a user. During this first extended high, the body burns off dopamine at an alarming rate. The body then must produce more of it to replace that which was lost. But when stressed, the body produces less dopamine.

The only way to restimulate dopamine production is to take more heroin. When the body begins to experience withdrawal symptoms — headache, diarrhea, nausea, night sweats, chills — it’s signaling a user that dopamine levels are insufficient. This is the primary reason that only one hit is needed to transform a person into a heroin addict.

Heroin, an opiate, is among the most powerfully addictive drugs in the world.

The Heralds are now two-thirds of the way through a multi-part series on the growing scourge of heroin abuse in Nassau County. We urge parents to sit down with their children and talk about this heinous drug. Information is critical. Kids have to understand that if they take heroin, they will surely wind up slaves to it. With heroin there is no such thing as a casual user.

As Bill Flanagan, the Nassau County Police Department’s second deputy commissioner, said, “This isn’t a Saturday-Sunday drug. It’s 24 hours a day, seven days a week, 365 days a year.”

Heroin can sell for as little as $5 a bag on the street. But after the first couple of hits, an addict may no longer feel high. He or she may simply need it to feel “normal” —that is, to not be sick and depressed. Users need more and more until they’re so hooked that they may sniff and inject 50 bags of it and spend more than $250 a day, as was the case with more than one recovering heroin addict whom the Herald interviewed.