• ricecake@sh.itjust.works
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    10 months ago

    It’s from the German word “heroisch”, which is basically “heroic”. They used it being a homonym for “heroine” to use women heroes or Valkyrie in marketing for a bit, because it’ll save you from that nasty cough.

    It didn’t really go by anything before, since it’s not something super easy to make, and so the first people to really make a lot of it was Bayer, and they named it heroin.

    Before heroin people had morphine, and heroin had been made as “diamorphine”, but it just wasn’t really a thing.

    • BearOfaTime@lemm.ee
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      10 months ago

      In the 80’s there was a brand of cough suppressant pills with codeine (prescription only) called Tussigon, as codeine is a an anti-tussive (anti-cough).