A drug, in contrast to a medicine, can have a positive or negative effect on a patient. For example, heroin is a drug, in that it’s a substance that causes a specific biological effect. Heroin is not, though, categorised as a substance that “prevents, alleviates or cures a symptom, ailment or disease state”. In that sense, heroin is a not a medicine.
Both drugs and medicines can be poisons, though. This depends on the dose of the drug and/or medicine. As Paracelsus (1493-1541), the founder of toxicology, said, “All things are poisons and nothing is without poison, only the dosage makes a thing not poison”.
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