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I was watching a documentary about the Oxy pipeline from Florida to Kentucky this weekend where a sheriff made the claim that Oxycontin was pharmaceutical-grade heroin. This is not the first time I had heard this claim but I assumed they were just using hyperbole. This sheriff claimed that the narcotic ingredient of both drugs was the same. A search reveals several sites that equate the drugs and say that the dependence is interchangeable. But are they the same narcotic or do they simply bind to the same receptors due to their opiate source?

L2G
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Chad
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  • Please provide notable claim. The top hits on the Google search you link to only talk about *"being similar"*, as both are synthetic opiates. – vartec Nov 21 '11 at 16:02
  • The claim was made in [This Documentary](http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1021079/) - I get that they are similar and that is why my question is are they basically the same drug or are they 2 different things that affect your brain the same way. – Chad Nov 21 '11 at 16:10
  • ok, but it seems clear that it just oversimplification/hyperbole, rather then actual claim. – vartec Nov 21 '11 at 16:12
  • @vartec - That is my suspicion too. Though the claim was one was made by Big Pharma the other in illegal labs. – Chad Nov 21 '11 at 16:13
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    Heroin was/is a pharmaceutical product developed by Bayer as a substitute for morphine. So heroin is a pharmaceutical grade heroin. – Sam I Am Nov 21 '11 at 17:11
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    @Chad: heroine, crystal meth, ecstasy were all at one point Big Pharma products (of course with different names). – vartec Nov 21 '11 at 17:38
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    @vartec - But pharmaceutical drugs are controlled and doses fairly accurate. Street drugs are uncontrolled and can be cut with assorted toxins at varying dosages. I am not attacking anyone for what they make. I just wanted to know if it was actually the same thing or not... if the Wikipedia article below is correct then I guess it is. – Chad Nov 21 '11 at 19:23
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    I think the sheriff isn't making the claim from a chemical or biochemical perspective, but from the perspective of societal and law-enforcement impacts. Indeed, much of the spike in heroin use/abuse seems to be linked to pharmaceutical opioid addiction (specifically Oxycontin), with the users turning to heroin either because their prescriptions run out and get get renewed, or because the heroin is much cheaper. So from those users' perspective, the heroin is basically a lower-grade Oxycontin substitute. – PoloHoleSet Jul 12 '17 at 14:01
  • s/b "can't get renewed" ^^^ – PoloHoleSet Jul 12 '17 at 14:07
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    @PoloHoleSet - I think he may have been mistaken, but his assertion was quite definitive that it was the same drug just at pharmaceutical grade instead of being cooked up and cut with what ever the cooker had handy. – Chad Jul 12 '17 at 15:16
  • Then I stand corrected. That's what I get for making assumptions about "hopefully he isn't quite that uninformed, in that position".... – PoloHoleSet Jul 12 '17 at 15:52

1 Answers1

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Oxycontin (oxycodone) and heroin are both opioids, but not exactly the same substance. So, no, Oxycontin is not "pharmaceutical grade heroin" — thats an oversimplification to say they're both opioids (so they work in a similar way).

Just take a look at their molecular structures to see that they're similar, but different:

Heroin:
Heroin

Oxycodone:
Oxycodone

Andrew Grimm
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oezi
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    Any chance of getting a non-Wikipedia source for these diagrams? The Wikipedia image rights indicate that it is original work. – Chad Nov 21 '11 at 19:23
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    even if the images themselves are original work, this shouldn't be a problem. the images just _visualize_ the molecular structure - wich itself is based on scientific evidence. – oezi Nov 21 '11 at 20:42
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    @Chad These images are produced by standard chemistry software. Paste in the INCHI or SMILES string to one of them and they should return the image. – Nick Oct 04 '12 at 17:13
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    This would be a better answer if it added a little on the reason why the structures have different effects (like the speed of action, and the distribution in the body). Subtle chemical changes make a big difference. – matt_black Jul 12 '17 at 08:57
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    The above chemical compound diagrams are a bit misleading if someone's not familiar with chemistry. While they're both technically correct (I'm assuming; haven't verified), they're drawn using different approaches that seem to suggest differences that aren't actually there. For example, on the right-most side of both images, there's a -CH_3 group, _but_, in the top one, it's explicitly labeled "-CH_3" while in the bottom one it's truncated to just a "-". This shorthand is technically valid, but could easily mislead people into thinking that those sections are different. – Nat Jul 12 '17 at 19:05
  • By the logic of the claim, them, one could say that poppy seeds are food-grade heroin. – T. Sar Jul 14 '17 at 19:01