How does heroin affect the body?
Heroin affects the body in so many ways that for the sake of space well give you a few of the most glaring. Heroin, like other opiate analgesics, causes constipation, stomach cramps and other gastrointestinal problems. It can cause difficulties in basic perception (recognizing reality) and it can cause impairments in attention span and judgment, not to mention hallucinations, manic or hypo manic episodes. Heroin wreaks havoc with sleep and often causes severe sleeplessness and at other times periods of over-sleeping (hypersomia). Heroin often causes severe loss of appetite creating lowered immune response and nutritional deficiencies and causes loss of sexual desire and sexual dysfunction. Heroin, because it is such a powerful depressant can easily cause respiratory depression and arrest (called O.D.) Another physical effect of heroin is the likelihood of being beaten, shot or raped in the normally crime-ridden areas where heroin is purchased.
