Heroin ‘craving’ too strong, even facing death

Health officials in Washington state and Oregon have
warned of an extremely pure heroin that may be responsible
for a spike in the number of heroin overdoses.

In Cowlitz County this month, the coroner reported seven
heroin deaths in just five days. Some of the dead were
found “with the needle still in their arm.”

“They’re just going straight into respiratory arrest,”
said County Coroner Tim Davidson. “Their whole
cardiovascular, respiratory system just shuts down.”

Officials in King County reported a similar spike in
March, when seven people died of heroin overdoses over a
period of just three days. Davidson said it would have
been impossible for the users to know they were about to
inject a deadly dose until it was too late.

Although heroin users have been urged to use caution while
authorities track down the source of the deadly doses,
many are unable to quit even in the face of imminent
death.

“It’s the effect. It’s hard to describe to somebody that’s
never been there,” said 22-year-old Justin LeBaron. “It
powers you, even though you don’t want it. Your body is
craving it.”

When he was a teenager, LeBaron and his older brother
began to take OxyContin together, an opiate that is a
known gateway to heroin. But while LeBaron eventually got
sober and worked as a counselor for others hooked on
drugs, his brother fell into a deep heroin addiction.

“It got to a point that he didn’t care. He wanted to die,”
LeBaron explained. “My brother, he told me many times that
he planned his death. I’d cry, because I didn’t know where
he was. I didn’t know how he was doing. I didn’t know if
he was alive.”

LeBaron said his brother had fallen so far into his
addiction that he didn’t care if his next dose was his
last; the idea of not getting high was much harder to
bear. And perhaps that is why health officials have not
gone as far as to urge users to quit, even given the spike
in overdoses.

Davidson’s office urged only that users not shoot up
alone.