The history of morphine goes far back in the past. In the Byzantine times was circulating among alchemists an elixir based on opium, but it is supposed that the specific formula was lost during the Ottoman conquest of Contantinople. A little bit later, in 1522, Paracelsus made reference to “laudanum”, also an elixir based on opium. The name laudanum comes from the Latin word laudare meaning “to praise”. He described it as a potent pain killer, but recommended that it be used sparingly.

After 1757, when the British conquer Bengal, the East India Company start to trade, another opiate recipe called “laudanum”, which became very popular among physicians and their patients. Morphine was discovered as the first active alkaloid extracted from the opium poppy plant in 1804 in Paderborn, Germany. The drug was first marketed to the general public by Sertürner and Company in 1817 as an analgesic, and also as a treatment for opium and alcohol addiction.

Later it was found that morphine was more addictive than either alcohol or opium, and its extensive use during the American Civil War allegedly resulted in over 400,000 sufferers from the “soldier’s disease” of morphine addiction. This idea has been a subject of controversy, as there have been suggestions that such a disease was in fact a hoax. Diacetylmorphine (better known as heroin) was synthesized from morphine in 1874 and brought to market by

Bayer in 1898. Heroin is approximately 1.5–2 times more potent than morphine on a milligram-for-milligram basis. Using a variety of subjective and objective measures, one study estimated the relative potency of heroin to morphine administered intravenously to post-addicts to be 1.80–2.66 mg of morphine sulfate to 1 mg of diamorphine hydrochloride (heroin).

Morphine became a controlled substance at the beginning of the 20th century, and possession without a prescription is a criminal offense almost all over the world. Morphine was the most commonly abused narcotic analgesic in the world until heroin was synthesized and came into use.

We strongly recommend to everyone reading this article to stay out of morphine abuse, however, if you or someone close to you have problems with morphine addiction, we suggest you to visit Drug Rehabilitation Canada