It All Begins With A Hit

Poppy flowers are so pretty, and they are everywhere. When you look at them, you would never think that such things like opium is made out them. Opium has been playing a big role in history in humanity. From the Opium War between China and UK, to the Civil War in the US, opium had significant influence. The Opium War was definitely was one of the worst things that happened to China, and the fault kind of goes to opium. In the Qing Dynasty, the British people brought the opium to China, and started huge trading and merchandising opium. People started to get lazy, including a lot of royal members, just wanted to smoke pipes all day and not work. This soon became a real problem for the society until the government attempted to stop the trading and importing of opium. That was when the Brits got angry and used opium as an excuse and started to fire bombs to China, eventually won the war and we paid Hongkong and tons of money for “compensation”.

Opium is used as a painkiller in the ancient times, and it gives the user a drowsiness effect. Not long after, people have started to use opium as recreational use. They give you a relaxed sensation and hallucination, but the biggest side effect is the hopeless addiction and the withdrawal effect is extremely severe. So what chemical is responsible for this stuff?

The opium resin contains two major alkaloids, the phenanthrenes and benzylisoquinolines (papaverine). Morphine, codeine and heroine are all opiate derivatives that are present in opium.  Morphine and codeine are actually utilized in the modern society as potent opiate analgesic drugs that relieve severe pain. Because their adverse affect, the drugs are prescription only. Especially morphine, is present in widely marketed drugs like Avinza and Kadian, etc. The side effects are more or less those of opium. Morphine acts on the myenteric plexus (part of the enteric nervous system) in the intestinal tract, thereby reducing gut motility, causing constipation. In addition, the addiction is very serious, and can lead to the condition similar to heroin addiction if not taken-in properly. Also, the withdrawal effects and addiction lead to great pain, such as depression, anxiety, mood swings and all those kind of bad things. Morphine, as a benzylisoquinoline alkaloid, the chemical structure contains several carbon rings and the ring system has little conformational flexibility (no isomers). Morphine can be made into codeine by methylation. Actually, by modifying morphine, you could create more than 200 derivatives and they all vary a little in functionality. Moreover, as we all know how bad heroin is and it doesn’t do anything good.

Opium has two sides, one to help people for pain relief, one to harm people and countries. Just like thalidomide, with its adverse influence on the previous users but now used to treat cancer. There are just good things you can find about them.

resources:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Morphine#Adverse_effects
http://www.chemistrydaily.com/chemistry/Opium
http://nzic.org.nz/ChemProcesses/biotech/12C.pdf