A friend of mine went through the Katrina/New Orleans thing and stayed and says that one of the things that happened was as the local supplies dried up the hard core heroin addicts started turning up dead as they couldn't get out and heroin couldn't get in. He tended bar on Bourbon Street.

As I've heard of this before I have to ask. Can anyone explain the mechanism of death that kills hardcore addicts suddenly cut off?

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Gimme a minute to read through Jay's latest observations...

There are a number of unpleasant heroin withdrawal symptoms, but AFAIK death is not a direct result. Are you sure you haven't heard an urban legend?

Nick

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Nick Theodorakis

National Institute of Drug Abuse: NIDA InfoFacts: Heroin

Maybe all the Katrina death-by-withdrawal cases are being lumped under heroin.

As for the mechanism, I'd expect it's just the fact of physical addiction, that the drug becomes required to stave off bad effects of addiction. When the drug isn't available, the lack ravages the body, sometimes fatally.

Wikipedia: Withdrawal

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Not sure about Heroin in particular, though I remember learning that it is one of the few drugs where withdrawal itself can kill, but for general mechanisms for death by withdrawal, I can think of several.
If a drug affecting heart rate is taken for a while the rate becomes normal while the drug is present, and goes the other way when removed. Increasing the dosage over time means the heart rate has time to normalize.
With a quick withdrawal, the swing back might cause cardiac arrest.

Ditto blood pressure, take a drug that cause increased blood pressure in increasing doses slow enough for the body to adapt and you can go into shock when the drug is removed.

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And the "driving on the freeway on a scooter" analogy still holds true because the pilots are sitting in 7 to 30 ton aircraft o' doom and you are running around them in your very own Meatbody, Mark I. Beep, beep.
Trying to make sense of computers, The Error Log.

The purple stripped one horned elephant holds the meaning of life.

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Thank God for magnetism.

As others have said, heroin withdrawal makes you feel like you're dying, but it very rarely kills anyone.
You can get an increase in blood pressure and heart rate, and you can also get diarrhoea that leads to dehydration and low blood pressure. Either of those might be dangerous in someone with cardiac disease. But heroin addicts aren't a population known for their high cardiac risk status.

Grant Hutchison

It is also possible that some opportunist saw an opportunity to make a quick buck by selling fake heroin (warfarin and powdered cleaning scourers are both used and are even worse for your health than heroin).

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Life is its own god.

Can you please ask the voices in your head to keep the noise down?

But in Germany, heroin addicts are/were being given syringes of opiate antagonist to deal (!) with the occasional accidental overdose. See: http://www.bmj.com/cgi/content/full/...urcetype=HWCIT

John

.... and being shot or slugged while out trying to score heroin is not an uncommon death for addicts in such situations. Heroin is thus not the direct result, but a secondary cause!!