In five pages 'speedballing' is examined in an overview that includes its dangerously growing trend and the death that can invariably result. Seven sources are cited in the bibliography.
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drug of choice. Overdosing and death does happen. Yet, what is even more lethal than heroin alone is the combination of heroin and another potent drug. In fact, speedballs have
taken the lives on many popular entertainers. Both comedian John Belushi and actor River Phoenix would die, one in 1982 and the other in 1993, by combining heroin
and cocaine into a powerful dose of what is deemed to be a speedball ("Opium," 2002). Of course, these popular drugs were used for many more years and opiate
derivatives had been used for centuries. Still, it seems that while the speedball is relatively popular--or was at least in the 1980s and the 1990s--its roots are based in 1950s
and 1960s culture. It was around the time of the Korean War era that the earliest intravenous use of amphetamines by U.S. servicemen had been noticeable (Casey, 2002).
Some soldiers who were stationed in Korea and Japan during the early part of the 1950s had begun to mix heroin with amphetamine and inject the combination into their
bloodstreams (Brecher, 1972 as cited in Casey, 2002). This is a variation of the traditional "speedball," where heroin and cocaine are combined (2002). Many in the armed forces
returned to the U.S. and brought the custom back to the states (2002). People were beginning to think in terms of drug combining instead of using them serially. During the
latter part of the 1950s, some San Francisco area physicians did in fact prescribe amphetamine injections in order to treat heroin addiction (2002). Many intravenous polydrug abusers do in
fact inject cocaine along with heroin either serially or through the injection in combination with a solution, something that is dubbed a speedball (Rowlett , Negus & Shippenberg, 2002). The