Where does Big Pharm get their Opium from?

In considering the reality that the brother of the Afghani President is the top Opium drug kingpin, and is on the CIA payroll, I wondered if Big Pharm has any interest in a plentiful world reserve of Opium. Opium is the source of several pharm grade drugs including Morphine and Codeine.

So where would they normally get their source product?

What interest would they have in having an overload of dirt cheap opium?

To what degree of their legitimate operations are they capable of being a major 'domestic' source of (byproduct) hardcore street drugs like heroin?

Who's in charge of the legitmate disposal of the heroin / etc byproduct of raw opium?

[edit on 13-11-2009 by IgnoranceIsntBlisss]

Actually the byproduct of the raw opium is the morphine and codeine

Herion is not a byproduct of the raw opium...it's synthesized from the morphine.

I starred your thread. I too would like to know if Big Pharma receives raw opium and extracts or if the US pays an outside agency to extract from the raw opium. It's one or the other. We get the stuff...and it comes from opium.

Mostly from Afghanistan i think.

Right here in Tasmania there are over 20000 hectares of land devoted to growing opium poppies for pharmaceutical companies. It's said to be the world's largest source of legally grown poppies.

India:

Legal production in India is much more traditional. As of 1996, opium was collected by farmers who were licensed to grow 0.1 hectare of opium poppies (0.24 acre), who to maintain their licenses needed to sell 4.5 kilograms of unadulterated raw opium paste at a fixed government price of 320 rupees ($8 US) per kilogram. One kilogram represents two days' work for a family. Some additional money is made by drying the poppy heads and collecting poppy seeds, and a small fraction of opium beyond the quota may be consumed locally or diverted to the black market. The opium paste is sun-dried and stirred in large pans before it is packed into cases of 60 kilograms for export. Purification of chemical constituents is done in India for domestic production, but typically done abroad by foreign importers.[76]


Legal opium importation from India and Turkey is conducted by Mallinckrodt, Noramco, Abbott Laboratories, and Purdue Pharma in the United States, and legal opium production is conducted by GlaxoSmithKline, Johnson and Johnson, Johnson Matthey, and Mayne in Tasmania, Australia; Sanofi Aventis in France; Shionogi Pharmaceutical in Japan; and MacFarlan Smith in the United Kingdom.[77] The UN treaty requires that every country submit annual reports to the International Narcotics Control Board, stating that year's actual consumption of many classes of controlled drugs as well as opioids and projecting required quantities for the next year. This is to allow trends in consumption to be monitored and production quotas allotted.

There you go.

Since NATO started messing about in Afghanistan though, opium production has been up on a yearly basis. Nothing like wholesale prices!!

Makes you wonder if Pharma's dirty tentacles reach into there as well.

Originally posted by Pilgrum
Right here in Tasmania there are over 20000 hectares of land devoted to growing opium poppies for pharmaceutical companies. It's said to be the world's largest source of legally grown poppies.

i think we grow around 50% of the worlds legal opium in tasmania

and here is the security ....

[atsimg]http://files.abovetopsecret.com/images/member/07a64a974fea.jpg[/atsimg]

they trust us with it!

reply to post by GioTheGreek


Nice job Gio!

In addition to opiates, coc aine in VAST quantities are processed in St.Louis, Mo.

A friend of mine worked at the factory in north/east St. louis, where most of the class 3 (can't remember if this is the correct classification, been along time since college) drugs are processed into a wide variety of pharma. derivitives.

He told me a story when the fail-safe (ironic) door system accidentally let both doors leading in to the processing room open at the same time, caused a gust of product to flow out from the room. Just when he and the rest of his shift were changing back into their street clothes.

He woke up in the hospital 4 hrs. later with the rest of the crew with what he said was the worst hangover he had ever expieienced in his life. ( he was a recovering drug addict ) So he knows what he is talking about.

The doctors told him that it took 3x's the antidote ( atropine and other amphetamine type derivities ) to bring him back!

As for where the opium goes, there used to be a show on satelite t.v. called Moscow Cops (their version of our show, also there is a Karachi Cops show I've seen too.) In one of the programs they showed a cone shaped paper roll filled with raw opium, (approx. $10) that a drug dealer was trying to sell.

They mentioned that the opium came from Afghanistan, and that when asked about why Muslims, (who are vehemently anti-drug use) produce opium, they said it was a sin for them to USE but NOT a sin to make it and money by making it, for infidels to use!

Remember, that the Taliban used the profits from drugs to fund their rise to power, then stopped production after attaining their goal.

The purpose of stopping opium production was to remove the infidel influence in Afghanistan, Well, we all know how that worked out, EH?



[edit on 11/13/09 by Keymaster1]

[edit on 11/13/09 by Keymaster1]

reply to post by silver tongue devil


Actually, My Bad. Sorry

[edit on 11/13/09 by Keymaster1]

Originally posted by silver tongue devil
Actually the byproduct of the raw opium is the morphine and codeine

Herion is not a byproduct of the raw opium...it's synthesized from the morphine.

You're right:
en.wikipedia.org...
I had forgotten the specifics of the process. Perhaps I should have freshened up on the ordeal before starting a thread.

So now the question is, is there more profit potential in street prices of herion, vs. hospital prices of morphine, as a measure of how much incentive would they have to have a backroom side operation in leaking out street product?

[edit on 13-11-2009 by IgnoranceIsntBlisss]

reply to post by 2theC


hahaha thats great!!

yea they probably get a little bit of it, im pretty sure a lot of the opium in afghanistan is made into heroin and being shipped here pretty easily

Originally posted by Keymaster1
reply to post by GioTheGreek

 

Nice job Gio!

In addition to opiates, coc aine in VAST quantities are processed in St.Louis, Mo.

Yeah, coc aine is at issue here too. I've read it's used in certain dental and eye operations.

Afganistan perhaps? It could be that the US will remain in Afganistan to import their major cash crop. The world is awash in the drugtrade and it goes back hundreds of yrs.

One of the solutions being considered is to create a legitimate market for the Opium being grown in Afghanistan. To keep it off of the 'black market'.

I just read the most recent UN report, which points out that the life cost of those crops is much larger than that of the military losses there.

reply to post by IgnoranceIsntBlisss

I could be wrong but I'm pretty certain that coc aine is no longer used in operations of any sort in the western world. I know it used to be standard as an anaesthetic in major operations but it has stopped being used as more effective and less harmful anaesthetics have become available. Could be wrong but don't think I am.

-Cauch1

Originally posted by Cauch1
reply to post by IgnoranceIsntBlisss

 

I could be wrong but I'm pretty certain that coc aine is no longer used

They still were as of around 2 years ago (actually might not have been that long). Had to have an adenoid or something like that biopsied.. The E/N/T Doc shoved up my nose a giant cotton ball dipped in what he said was "Pharmaceutical Cocaine". I believe him, I couldn't shut up for a few hours afterwards!

In the U.S. here.