Word: heroines
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When Ted C., a heroin junkie and former baseball umpire, heard about an experimental new treatment for his addiction, he was skeptical. Doctors told him that a simple pill called buprenorphine could eradicate his enormous craving for the narcotic, which he had been snorting daily for several years. It sounded too good to be true--junkies live in fear of the agony that arrives when a hit wears off--so Ted bought an extra bag of heroin the night before he took buprenorphine for the first time. Just in case...
...this time there was no pain. "I went to the clinic, took the pill and went home. I used the last of the bag and haven't touched heroin since," he says. That was April, and today he still takes the tablets--one a day keeps the craving away--but he expects to stop using the drug in a few months. "There was no struggle," he says. "There is no downside to the drug...
Testimonials such as Ted's have researchers across the U.S. claiming a breakthrough in the treatment of heroin addiction. Today most addicts who want to kick the drug are sent to clinics that administer methadone. But that cure is nearly as troublesome as the disease it treats. Methadone produces its own high and is so addictive that it has its own black market. To receive it legally, addicts must report every day to authorized clinics, something many are loath to do. Before buprenorphine, Ted tried methadone and found the experience a lot like taking heroin--only...
...passing flicker of a high, if that--and it is not addictive. Consequently, the FDA is expected to approve the drug by spring, which would allow physicians to dispense it from the privacy of their offices. For many, that will be not a moment too soon. During the 1990s, heroin addiction has spread to groups ill-served by existing treatment networks: professionals like Ted and middle-class, often suburban, teens. The majority of addicts are still poor, city-dwelling adults, but teens account for more than a fifth of those who say they have taken heroin in the past year...
...fight against addiction, breakthrough promises have been made and broken many times; methadone was once considered a miracle drug, and heroin itself was developed to cure addictions. But researchers say buprenorphine could be the answer. Like heroin and methadone, it bonds to certain receptors in the brain, blocking the pain they transmit and convincing the brain that the cravings have been satisfied. Yet somehow it does that without creating cravings for itself. Even long-term junkies who try buprenorphine simply do not want heroin anymore...