LONDON (Reuters) - Supplies of a powerful painkiller used to treat cancer patients are near critical lows, the Department of Health says. It said a supply problem with the opiate-based drug diamorphine meant stocks would soon reach a "critical level" and urged doctors to conserve stocks and use the drug only for terminally ill patients. (Article here)
So where's it all gone, eh? Who's hoarding it? Are we going to see the spectacle of pain specialists hanging around King's Cross looking for dealers?
It's kind of worrying, being serious a while, because heroin — yes, diamorphine, 3, 6-diacetylmorphine, (5α,6α)-7,8-didehydro-4,5-epoxy-17-methylmorphinan-3,6-diol diacetate if you want to be all IUPAC about it, that's heroin, except that 'heroin' is a Bad Thing and 'diamorphine' is a Proper Medicine — is made from morphine, and if there's a heroin famine that may mean there's a morphine famine, and I rather need my little pink pills.
No, not 'need' in a junkie kind of way, don't worry, just 'need' to handle the breakthrough pain.