Brief History of Cocaine

Coca is said to be the one of the oldest, most potent and most dangerous stimulants of natural origin. The earliest recorded use of cocaine dated back three thousand years before the birth of Christ. The Ancient Incas of the Andes Mountain chewed coca leaves to improve their work performance. The leaves speed up their breathing to adapt in the thin mountain air.

In early times, Peruvians only chewed coca leaves during religious rites. However, the Spanish soldiers broke the taboo when they invade their country in 1532. The Spanish regime forced laborers working in the silver mines to chew the coca leaves. This makes the laborers easy to control and exploit.

The First Initiatives

The German Chemist Albert Neiman first isolated cocaine from the coca leaves extract in 1859. The anesthetic properties of the drug were not discovered until the 1880s. During those times, cocaine when gained popularity in the medical community.

The Austrian psychoanalyst Sigmund Freud, used the drug himself. He was the first ever individual to broadly promote cocaine as a tonic to treat sexual impotence and depression.

However, Freud acted as a subjective observer, using cocaine constantly and even prescribed it to his girlfriend. He also recommended the drug to his best friend and for general use.

In 1912, the United States government reported 5,000 cocaine-related deaths in one year and by 1922, the drug was officially banned.

During the 1970s, cocaine becomes the newest trend as a drug of choice for entertainers and in the upper-class society. Cocaine seemed to be the perfect companion for a trip into the fast lane. It “provided energy” and helped people stay “up.”

In the past, people consider cocaine as a wealthy man’s drug, because of the large expense maintaining the addictive habit. However, in the late 1980’s cocaine loses its flair as the drug of choice for the rich people. On that time, it gained a reputation as the US most dangerous and addictive drug associated with crime, poverty, and death.

As of 2008, cocaine had become the second most trafficked illegal drug in the world.

Production Process of Cocaine

Cocaine in its purest form derives from the leaves of the coca plant. Also, this drug is a member of huge species of other plant-based alkaloid drugs like nicotine, caffeine, and morphine.

When makers isolated and dried the cocaine into an organic form, cocaine looks like a white, crystalline powder. However, it very unlikely that someone can find pure, uncut cocaine in the black market.

Cocaine comes in one of two forms:

  •  Hydrochloride salt form
  •  Base form

In order to manufacture the salt form, the drug has to be neutralized with an acid solvent. The final product appears in powder form which is the hydrochloride salt. This form can be either snorted – as is – or dissolved in water for intravenous use. The base form of cocaine includes any manufacturing process that doesn’t use acid as a neutralizer.

The drug dealers or “distributors” usually cut a batch of cocaine with other additives. This helps to thin out the batch, which means a dealer has more of the drug to sell. Depending on which type that the dealers used, the final result can look like pinkish or off-white powdered cocaine. Also, the texture of the drug can also change based on the additive used.

Additives used with cocaine come in the forms of:

  • Adulterants
  •  Substitutes

Usually, dealers use adulterants to stretch the amount of cocaine to generate more money from the drug.

Examples of Adulterants are the following:

  1. Laundry detergents
  2. Laxatives
  3. Boric acids

Substitutes work to mimic some of the effects of actual cocaine at a cheaper cost than cocaine itself.

Local anesthetics are examples of substitutes like:

  1. Procaine
  2. Tetracaine
  3. Lidocaine

Freebase Cocaine Cuts

Unlike the salt form of cocaine, freebase cocaine is a drug with a base form that can be smoked, snorted or injected.

Instead of the acid neutralizer used to make salt-based cocaine, freebase cocaine involves the use of:

  • Ammonia as a base agent.
  • Ether as a solvent.

The mixture is then dried to form a powdery substance. In some cases, the ether actually dries into the final powdered cocaine product. When this happens, the cocaine user can develop burns along the throat and nasal passages.

Freebase cocaine is:

  • Purer than the salt-based form of cocaine, due to most additives are filtered out during the manufacturing process.
  • More addictive when smoked. Cocaine can reach the brain more quickly through snorting or injections, resulting in a fast onset of its stimulating effects.

There is a huge difference between the substances used to make cocaine and the additives used to ‘cut’ it. These types of substances increase the health complications that come from using cocaine.

How Is Cocaine Made?

  • Producing cocaine mainly involves dissolving cocaine hydrochloride in water and then mixing it with or ammonia or baking soda.
  • Before the mixture forms into rock form, dealers usually cut the powdered form. They use a readily available additive or adulterant in the market.  While it’s preferable to use materials that cause little to no damage to the body such as:
  1. such as baking soda
  2.  Powdered sugar
  3.  Powdered milk

Usually, users transform the drug to prepare it as an intravenous injection. These solid substances can still generate deadly effects if circulated throughout the body.

  • The mixture is then heated until the hydrochloride chemical evaporates. When the mixture dries out, the drug will eventually form a rock-like appearance that “crackles” when smoked.

Crack cocaine, or crack rocks appears as a  brownish or tan-like colors with either a crumbly or hard surface texture. Knowing these information will greatly help, especially to those who are into online market to find out the best SEO for addiction treatment and help individuals.

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