LEWISTON – It’s a drug with a fun name but police say it can be a killer.

On the street, it’s known as “bupe,” but drug agents and health officials know it by its pharmaceutical names: buprenorphine, naloxene or Suboxene.

The hexagonal pills are meant to be the latest in the attack on opiate addiction. According to the pharmaceutical group that manufactures it, Suboxene is designed to combat withdrawal from heroin, pain pills and other opiates.

Available as an alternative for methadone, Suboxene is prescribed by physicians rather than handed out at clinics. But even with those controls, police say the drug is making its way onto local streets and being used by people who want to curb withdrawal while pursuing euporhia from other drugs, like marijuana or cocaine.

“The mind is stronger than the medication,” said Maine Drug Enforcement Supervisor Gerry Baril. “The addict is still seeking the high. The brain still craves a high.”

Nationally, drug experts say recreational use of “bupe” is spreading, flaring particularly in New England. Locally, investigators say they are finding the drug mostly on people with an addiction to painkillers.

“It’s like any other drug,” Baril said. “Once it becomes available, it has the potential to be abused.”

Drug agents in Maine have been finding more and more of the narcotic on people who are being investigated for dabbling in other drugs, like heroin or oxycodone.

“We’re finding people who don’t have a prescription who are in possession of the drug,” Baril said. “It’s starting to be diverted more onto the streets.”

A local woman who used the drug to control an addiction to the painkiller Vicodin told police she was required to go through a substance abuse program to get a prescription. She reported good results with the drug.

Suboxene, when used legitimately, is intended to dissolve under the tongue. But police say addicts using the drug recreationally will crush the pills and then snort or inject it.

The practice can be deadly. In some parts of the country, victims who fatally overdose later show signs of Suboxene during toxicology testing.

The drug is dispensed by Reckitt Benckiser Pharmaceuticals Inc. of Richmond, Va. The company spent $26 million to bring the drug to the market and introduced it in 2003.

According to the Benckiser Web site, the pills come in tablets of two or eight milligrams. Police say the drug will fetch as much as $10 per tab on the streets.

The Baltimore Sun, which published a research story on “bupe” earlier this week, found that New England has the nation’s highest rate of Suboxene prescribing.

“This is a disturbing report, and we need to review it and get some answers,” Sen. John Kerry, D-Mass., said Wednesday in a written statement.

In some areas, “bupe” is also known as “stop signs” or “subbies.” But few people in the Lewiston area, including most patrol officers, have heard of it at all.

Like he does with other drugs that emerge as problems in the area, Baril is educating police and health care workers about the emergence of another drug on the streets.

“We’re learning as we go,” he said.