Word: heroines
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Overdoses kill some 22,000 Americans each year - more than homicide and, in some states, like Utah, more than car accidents. Most overdose deaths happen accidentally, and most involve a combination of an opioid - either prescription painkillers, like methadone or OxyContin, or street drugs like heroin - and other depressant drugs, such as alcohol or Xanax. (Such deadly cocktails were responsible for the deaths of actor Heath Ledger in 2008 and former Playboy Playmate Anna Nicole Smith in 2007.) Typically, people who overdose on prescription drugs have a history of addiction, and they end up either taking more than their prescribed...
...part, that's because few overdose victims get immediate medical treatment. While most overdoses take place in the presence of other people (surveys of heroin users suggest that 58% to 86% were not alone when an overdose occurred), many bystanders don't call the authorities for help, usually because they're high themselves. Naloxone kits can be crucial in these circumstances...
Advocates also note that the drug, which has been used for decades in emergency rooms and ambulances, is safe. Naloxone reverses a high by blocking the brain's opioid receptors, where drugs like heroin and narcotic painkillers bind. According to Daliah Heller, an assistant commissioner of the New York City Department of Health, who is involved with the city's naloxone program, serious side effects from the drug (aside from triggering withdrawal symptoms in addicts) are extremely rare. But they're not unheard of: in rare instances, high doses of naloxone have caused seizures, but, says Heller, "It's much...
...many prisons, cell phones have become as valuable as drugs, if not more so. In a recent sting operation in Texas, an undercover officer was offered $200 by a prisoner for a cell phone and only $50 for heroin. California officials say inmates currently fork over between $100 and $400 to obtain a smuggled cell phone. It's easy to understand why cell phones command such a premium. Unlike the one-time sale of drugs, an inmate can rent out the same phone dozens of times to fellow inmates...
...indicted for drug-smuggling. Over the next 18 years he built what federal officials described as Mexico's biggest drug-trafficking empire, one that dealt directly with Colombian kingpin Pablo Escobar to move cocaine. Félix Gallardo also began to grow marijuana and opium - the raw ingredient for heroin - on Mexican soil. There were 15 arrest warrants with his name on them in Mexico and others in the United States before Mexican federal agents finally nabbed the capo without firing a shot in 1989. "Félix Gallardo had become the most wanted drug trafficker both at national...