AUGUSTA, Maine – 

You wouldn’t expect a place like quiet, rural Maine to be at the epicenter of a nationwide drug epidemic, but the capital city, Augusta, is experiencing a massive influx in O.D.s and hospitalizations as a new street drug, ‘diet heroin’ has hit the streets and become popular with the youth.

Diet heroin is almost identical in nature to regular heroin, an opiate, except that diet heroin will help to keep those pesky, drug-fueled pounds from forming around your mid-section.

“Frankly, I was scared to heroin, mostly because I didn’t want to get fat,” said Jennifer August, of Bangor, Maine. “My friends all started doing diet heroin, though, and none of them gained any weight. In fact, most lost a ton. Now I can party-hardy on the weekends, but not get fat, either. I’m pretty stoked.”

As popular films over the years, such as the sleeper film Trainspotting, glorified heroin use, teens across the country began using it in record numbers. Lately, as more and more doctors become flippant about their prescriptions, many adults also became hooked on heroin, after being prescribed pain killers such as Oxycontin. When those prescriptions would run out, the users turned to heroin – which is much cheaper and easier to obtain than Oxy on the streets.

“I was paying $20 a pill for Oxys, so basically I was having to sell my mouth to make the pain go away,” said Joe Goldsmith. “I switched to heroin when I realized how much cheaper it was. That worked, but I was kinda fat. Now I go with diet heroin. It’s a little pricer, but still, I don’t look so bloated. It’s great! I’m still in tons of pain and I’m throwing up a lot. I’ve been in the hospital 5 or 6 times, but hell. You have to do what you have to do to not feel the pain while keeping the weight off.”