What to know about liquid heroin in US after 1.4 tonnes seized in 'astronomical' Oregon bust?

The question of "what is liquid heroin?" sparked widespread curiosity when authorities in Oregon revealed the seizure of 1.4 metric tonnes of the drug last week.

As per the National Institute on Drug Abuse, heroin can be naturally found in the seed pod of opium poppy plants in certain regions of Asia, Mexico, and Colombia. Ingesting the medicine as a powder, which can be white, brown, or black, is how it is most frequently used in the United States, according to USA Today.

According to a Los Angeles recovery facility, the extremely addictive narcotic hasn't been commonly available in liquid form until lately.

As per the Clean Recovery Centres, a drug-rehabilitation organisation located in Tampa, Florida, liquid heroin is powdered heroin that has been dissolved in water, cooked, and injected. It is very simple to inject powder or even tablets that have been converted into a serum.

Compassion Behavioural Health of Los Angeles states that the drug's liquid form has a higher risk for heroin addiction due to its quicker blood-brain barrier crossing than other forms.

After morphine, which is produced when heroin metabolises, "binds to opioid receptors in the brain, spinal cord, and other organs, resulting in a powerful analgesic and euphoric effect."

According to a news release from the US Attorney's Office, law enforcement learned late last month that multiple employees of a transnational criminal organisation with its headquarters in Mexico were bringing huge amounts of illegal substances into Oregon.

"Investigators followed a rented moving truck and a red pickup to a motel in Tigard, Oregon, where they served a search warrant and found eight barrels containing 370 gallons of liquid heroin and two guns," the US Attorney's Office said.

Assistant US Attorney Scott Kerin described the quantity of liquid heroin as "astronomical" in court last week, as reported by The Oregonian.