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5. Fentanyl

Heroin’s ADHD little brother

Let’s go ahead and mix metaphors: fentanyl is heroin on crack.  Sound bad?  F produces effects like heroin but several hundred times as powerful.  Taken carefully, fentanyl is perhaps no worse than morphine– euphoric, relaxing, and highly addictive.  But fentanyl is often sold as heroin.  Users then mistakenly administer far more of the powerful drug than their bodies can handle.  Difficulty breathing, confusion, unconsciousness and death ensue.

fentanyl

This is not to say that fentanyl users are safe as long as they dose appropriately.  Fentanyl is extremely addictive; it is also the most common synthetic opiate in modern medicine.  As such, it is available to addicts in the form of skin patches (which addicts chew, snort, smoke, and… ugh… supposit), lollipops (use your imagination), and a variety of sprays and tablets that, with a little desperate ingenuity, can supply an addict his or her much-needed high.  Even among informed fentanyl users, overdose and death is rampant.  More people die today in Estonia by overdosing on F than by road accidents.  Let’s be honest: you’re best off avoiding this one.