Marketing coinage, perhaps based on sublingual (“administered through placement under the tongue”).
Subutex (uncountable)
- (pharmacology) A (now discontinued) brand name for buprenorphine, used to treat opiate addictions.
2010, Simon Eddisbury, Lowlife, London: John Blake, →ISBN, page 22:He was a Subutex addict. Subutex is supposedly used to wean people off heroin but, from what I have seen, there are more Subutex addicts in jail than there are heroin addicts (and there are a lot of heroin addicts).
2013, Mitch Winehouse, Amy, My Daughter, London: Harper, →ISBN, page 120:She'd seen a doctor who’d prescribed Subutex, a drug-replacement treatment designed to wean the user off heroin. It had made her throw up. I was so relieved and told her how proud I was of her for taking control.
