1943

Theodor Morell, Hitler’s personal physician, begins giving Hitler injections of Eukodal (with active ingredient oxycodone, released by Merck in 1917) for relief of severe abdominal pain, enabling Hitler to travel by train to Italy for a state meeting with Axis powers, where his agenda was to keep Mussolini from withdrawing from the war. Hitler “was hyped up at his meeting with Mussolini . . . [and] talked for three hours without a break in a dull voice to his beleaguered fellow dictator” (Ohler, 138). Between September and December 1944, after attempt on his life, the injection became so frequent “one must consider the possibility of a physical dependency. The happy fix came at a cost of unpleasant side-effects: insomnia, tremors, and constipation” (182). The Eukodal was often administered with anti-convulsive Eupaverin, a synthetic analogue of paverine from the opium poppy (164, 181).