You are correct. I forgot about our friends across the pond. I believe I read heroin was supposed to be a less addictive alternative of morphine. I don't know much about opioids, I wonder what the breakdown in pricing is between commercial, hospital heroin versus something Oxycontin. I'm guessing it's probably cheaper to produce hospital heroin and drug companies can't compete with it.
Also consider that the US army burns the enormous afghan poppy harvest every summer while big pharma synthesises its opiate molecules at great expense.