The symptoms methadone users associate with using it such as bone pain 
and dental problems rare a result of their heroin use and poor 
nutrition. Once they stop using heroin they become aware of these 
somatic concerns. The methadone not cause them.

On 6/16/2011 11:16 AM, Eric Schneider wrote:
> In the 1970s, when methadone clinics were expanding rapidly, there 
> were many scandals about lax administration and drug dealing.  A New 
> York Times reporter was admitted to a methadone program and given 
> methadone without evidence of addiction to heroin, for example, in a 
> widely reported story.  Hustlers sold clean urine samples, methadone 
> users traded "spit-backs" for cocaine or other drugs,  and the areas 
> around clinics became staging areas, where deals for drugs or criminal 
> escapades could be planned.  Generally clinics were sited in areas of 
> high drug use, and as Camilo Vergara has shown in his photographs, the 
> clinics themselves took on the look of fortresses, in part to prevent 
> break ins and theft.
>
> However, federal legislation significantly tightened administration of 
> methadone, and methadone itself took on a bad name among at least some 
> users, who claimed it was significantly more addicting than the heroin 
> they were trying to get off, and that it caused lethargy, body aches 
> and "bone pain."  That together with the end of the heroin drought in 
> the mid to late 1970s lessened demand among heroin users for methadone.
>
> In a relatively recent (five or six years ago) tour of methadone 
> clinics in Philadelphia, I found most were associated with hospitals 
> or health centers and not particularly noticeable to a passerby, but 
> they continue to be sited in areas of high drug use, so it is somewhat 
> difficult to distinguish the effects of a clinic from neighborhood 
> effects more generally.
>
> Since I am generally supportive of harm reduction and drug maintenance 
> programs, I would like to be more supportive, but frankly I would 
> blanch if someone proposed putting one next to my house.
> -- 
> Eric Schneider
> Assistant Dean and Associate Director for Academic Affairs
> Adjunct Professor of History
> University of Pennsylvania
> 120 Cohen Hall
> Philadelphia PA 19104-6304
> [log in to unmask]
> Phone: (215) 898-6341
> Fax:  (215) 573-2023
>
> For information about Smack:  Heroin and the American City, see
> http://www.upenn.edu/pennpress/book/14532.html
> http://www.upenn.edu/pennpress/podcast/
>