Cheaper scripts than heroin?

[quale]

So I was reading this article.
It suggested that prescribing heroin to addicts could cost the government $363m a year. Now if it is going to be this expensive why don't they just mass produce some strong opiod and use it instead.
I understand the idea is that junkies will go for heroin but won't go for methadone. But wouldn't they got for oxymorphone or fentanyl as well at much cheaper unit prices? Aren't there any powerful long lasting opiates?

 

[PhreeX]

Yeah, of course there are cheaper drugs but I think the idea is to make heroin available to those that want it... also, think of the chaos that would ensue of pharmacists had to fill scripts all dayfor various narcotics to placate some junky?
Still, it's a damn good idea and I would like to see this happen..

 

[quale]

I guess what I am asking is what is magical about heroin that the government should script it rather than some cheaper alternative. Heroin requires alot of poppies to produce it and those are expensive no?
Surely on a large scale if they are worried about keeping costs down they could substitute something. Not for each junkie could they substitute something but could they find something that pretty much everyone was willing to take over heroin?

 

[PhreeX]

Originally posted by quale:
I guess what I am asking is what is magical about heroin that the government should script it rather than some cheaper alternative. Heroin requires alot of poppies to produce it and those are expensive no?
Surely on a large scale if they are worried about keeping costs down they could substitute something. Not for each junkie could they substitute something but could they find something that pretty much everyone was willing to take over heroin?You hit the nail on the head about high cost being directly related to the labor involved ..
I think s lot of it has to do with the mindset of the user - a lot of junkies want "heroin" .. they don't realize there are pharmacuticals WAY MORE POWERFULL and WAY MORE EUPHORIC ..
Also, I know this isn't in the US, but here (in the states) the drug would have to be approve for use with addicts - you think it would pass over there?
Who knows how this will turn out?

 

[Tristan K]

Its unreasonable to think herion will ever be legal. Same goes with cocaine and meth for that matter. There are too many reasons why it will never happen. But a few are pharmacutical companies would fight it to death, and politicians would follow suit as they understand to fill their pockets with dough they gotta be the pharms whipping boys. Of course it doesnt really make sense logically, but what really does for that matter anyway? Anyway as mentioned in the post above me, it is not like you cant find very,very able substitutes to satisfy your desires in the wonderful vast world of pharms.

 

[zorn]

Heroin is actually likely the cheapest thing, or close to it. IIRC pretty much ALL semisynthetic opioids start from morphine extracted from poppies... a coupla plants and Third-world farmers are a shitload cheaper than some fancy-ass chemical processing center. Morphine->heroin takes virtually zero effort, and so H (quite potent) may well be more cost-effective than hydromorph or oxymorph or any of the slightly more potent morphine-based semisynthetics.
The fentanyls might be cheaper per dose, despite higher production costs, just because of their incredibly high potency. But they're almost all very short-acting, so the difference would be noted.
I think hospital prices for morphine run about 2 cents/mg... heroin would be little more, and assuming 25mg pure heroin in a dose (this is a guess), that'd be about 50 cents per bag/dose. At that rate, even the most hard-core addict shouldn't require more than $10/day worth.
Too bad the shit's not legal, even the poorest McD-working single-mother would have no trouble supporting any sort of habit.

 

[travis2600]

H (quite potent) may well be more cost-effective than hydromorph or oxymorph or any of the slightly more potent morphine-based semisynthetics.
Isn't oxymorphone several times more potent than H? That means a fraction of the amount of morphine would be required. that isn't a slight difference.
As for fentanyl... do heroin adicts really want something long-acting? That means it will be longer until they get another rush of H... I don't know really, I've never been addicted to an opiate.

 

[quale]

Yes but zorn is presumably taking into effect the costs of running that synth on the substance and he may be right. Moreover as their are probably about a million heroin addicts in the UK it seems they are supporting their program for about $1 a day per addict (or plan to be).
I know they have developed analoges of fentanyl with shorter half lives on purpose maybe there is a crazy one with a long half-life.
You could give out the medication in other forms such as patches or some other long lasting form. Of course if the desire is to shot up often then fentanyl analoges are even better.

 

[PhreeX]

Sure will be interesting to see how this turns out.. I would say it WONT EVER HAPPEN simply as if ONE COUNTRY could make it legally then the rest of the world would be flooded with pharmacutical grade smack.. yeah, they could try to control it but it certinly wouldn't work..

 

[mardux420]

Its unreasonable to think herion will ever be legal. Same goes with cocaine and meth for that matter.
Hah!
Totally untrue. Methamphetamine is not illegal. It's avaliable by prescription under the name Desoxyn. It's virtualy impossible to get a script to unless you are extreemly morbidly obese but, it is Schedual II!

 

[travis2600]

Sure will be interesting to see how this turns out.. I would say it WONT EVER HAPPEN simply as if ONE COUNTRY could make it legally then the rest of the world would be flooded with pharmacutical grade smack.. yeah, they could try to control it but it certinly wouldn't work..
But there already are sucessfull programs that do this in the netherlands, correct?

Its unreasonable to think herion will ever be legal. Same goes with cocaine and meth for that matter.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
Hah!
Totally untrue. Methamphetamine is not illegal. It's avaliable by prescription under the name Desoxyn. It's virtualy impossible to get a script to unless you are extreemly morbidly obese but, it is Schedual II!
No, it is also possible to get it by having ADD.
And cocaine is schedual II as well, for that matter.

 

[HYDRO_CHRONIC]

"Isn't oxymorphone several times more potent than H? That means a fraction of the amount of morphine would be required. that isn't a slight difference. "
this was taken from erowid
"There are two derivatives of morphine: hydromorphone (Dilaudid or 'little D ') and oxycodone (Percocet, Percodan, or 'perkies '). Dilaudid has two to eight times the painkilling effects of morphine while Percocets are similar to codeine but stronger."

 

[*KANE*]

I don't know... NOW , if I want the euphoria I go for the smack ,but I used to prefer oxy and get smack until I got more OC. Now I take oxy to maintain myself until I get some heavy D.
i think I could have explained this better but i'm not starting over.

 

[Tristan K]

First of all, desoxyn is "legal"(but only for about .000001% of the population). And cocaine isnt used medically to stick up your nose or smoke, so it is not "legal" in the way you are thinking of it as. But I dont think we were debating wheter or not they had pharmacutical potential in the first place. And believe me, desoxyn will have virtually vanished(even more so than now) in the next ten years. You should join the legalize marijauna movement because the herion/cocaine movement isnt going anywhere in your lifetime.

 

[quale]

It is my understanding that the netherlands and switzerland either had, or had passed resolutions to create such program already. It isn't that unimaginable.