Opiates and pain

Most people have no idea how long opiates have been used as a mood altering drug or as a pain-killer. Below is from the Atlantic:

The earliest reference to opium growth and use is in 3400 B.C. when the opium poppy was cultivated in lower Mesopotamia. The Sumerians referred to the opium poppy as “Hul Gil” – the “Joy Plant,” and would pass the plant and its euphoric effects on to the Assyrians, who in turn passed it on to the Egyptians.¹

Around 460-357 B.C., Hippocrates, the “father of medicine,” acknowledged opium’s usefulness as a narcotic and styptic in treating internal diseases, diseases of women and epidemics. He prescribed drinking the juice of the white poppy mixed with the seed of nettle.²

Alexander the Great introduced opium to India near 330 B.C., and the Arabs, Greeks and Romans used it as a sedative.²

Approximately 220-264 A.D., the noted Chinese surgeon Hua To of the Three Kingdoms used opium preparations and Cannabis indica for his patients to swallow before undergoing major surgery.³

During the Middle Ages opium was banned from the east, but soon enough a German chemist named Friedrich Wilhelm Adam Sertürner isolated morphine from opium. The name Morphine comes from the god of dreams, Morpheus.

In the early 20th century, regulations started prohibiting the import of opium to smoke, and then more and more regulations have led to the present control over opiates. Of course regulations haven’t prevented a black market for illegal opiates. Opiate use is on the rise in the US, especially prescribed pain-killers which are legal but just as dangerous. The brain doesn’t distinguish between an opiate bought on the street or the opiate prescribed by a doctor.

As for opiates and pain, a person in physical pain might have good reasons for taking opiate medication, but once addicted the use of opiates is no longer for pain, unless we’re talking about the pain of withdrawal. Most research has shown that long term use of opiates for chronic pain is likely counter-productive, so anyone using opiates for years to deal with pain might be misled or might have a problem with opiates and should seek help. Medication-assisted withdrawal is showing much success if the medication is taken properly. Withdrawal from opiates can last for a long time if the person has used opiates heavily for a long time, so recovery has to be managed for the long term.