A new report states that anti-diarrhea medicine Imodium causes addiction that can lead to death.

According to Annals of Emergency Medicine report, drug addicts are now turning to turning to over-the-counter Imodium to get high. Those who want to get high swallow 50 to 200 pills at a time, which causes the active ingredient loperamide to enter the central nervous system and deliver that high feeling. It costs less than $2, which is less than compared to heroin with price tag from $5 to $10.

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The study also revealed that it can be dangerous to the heart, leading to overdose and death. Overdoses have been linked to deaths or life-threatening irregular heartbeats in at least a dozen other cases in five states in the last 18 months. Most physicians just recently realized loperamide could be abused, and few look for it. Many toxicologists and emergency department doctors suspect that it is more widespread than scattered reports suggest.

Loperamide is the opioid found in medications like Imodium. Since it was approved by the FDA decades ago, loperamide has been used to help with diarrhea. However, now word is spreading about how dangerous this drug can be in high doses.

“It’s meant to stop diarrhea, so in large doses it’s going to stop the whole GI system,” said Tama Sawyer, who oversees the University of Kansas Hospital Poison Control Center.

Imodium is legal, cheap and can be bought over-the-counter at the drug store in large quantities without raising suspicion. Unlike cough medication, no ID is required to purchase Imodium. The drug is safe when used at recommended doses. There is no high and a low potential for abuse. But if users take enough pills, a heroin-like high is produced.

William Eggleston, a pharmacist and clinical toxicologist at the Upstate New York Poison Control Center, said that they have received 10 phone calls related to Imodium from 2011 to 2014. Last year alone, the center received 11.

In addition, Eggleston said that people who overdosing in anti-diarrhea medicine is looking either for self-treatment of withdrawal symptoms or euphoria.

TagsImodium, heroin, Loperamide, Drug addiction, addiction, overdose, drug overdose