Biological Consequences Of Heroin Abuse

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Heroin is known as a schedule I drug meaning that at the moment there is no currently accepted medical use for this drug and that it has a high rate of abuse. Heroin is a potent derivative of morphine, a natural substance taken from opium poppy plants (Hart, C., KSIR, C., 2015). It can be in the form of white or black powder or a black sticky substance known as black tar heroin (Hart, C., KSIR, C., 2015). This drug can be taken by snorting, injecting, or smoking. There are serious biological impacts on those who use heroin. For one, changing the body’s way of reacting to pain and second altering the ways that genes are expressed in the brain. Once heroin enters the body it binds to and activates muopioid receptors in the brain and throughout