Opium Poppy, Papaver somniferum
By Louise Joly (of AtelierJoly) [CC BY-SA 1.0 (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/1.0)], via Wikimedia Commons
Medicinal Garden information:
Medicines derived from the opium poppy is an effective pain reliever. This poppy is the source of many narcotics, including morphine, thebaine, codeine, papaverine and noscapine.
Opium alkaloids morphine and codeine are derived from the opium poppy. Globally, opium has gradually been superseded by a variety of purified, semi-synthetic, and synthetic opioids with progressively stronger effects, and by other general anesthetics.
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