World Drug Traffic Map
 | ||||
| Drugs - World Wide |
In a bar near the back bathroom of New York, Jim Smith is opening a tiny packet of white powder known as Cocaine. Jim's a successful Wall Street day trader who is among the young and rich experimenting with Cocaine as a recreation drug. The powder is placed into a neat pile as Jim pulls out a platinum American Express card and begins forming skinny lines of white powder.
"Usually I can bribe the bathroom guy $50 and get some privacy for about 15 minutes" he says, taking apart his Parker pen and begins inhaling the first line up his nose. Gone in seconds, he kicks his head back and grabs hold of the counter, looking a little dizzy. "The first hit always puts me on my ass" he tells me. "A few more lines of this shit and I'll be trading all night long from home in the foreign markets.
I ask him how much the coke cost him. "About $200" he says, dipping his fingers into the white powder and begins rubbing some along his gumline. "Why is it so expensive?" I ask him. He looks at me dead seriously and lowers his voice. "Because this shit isn't cut. It's the real deal. Half the crap you buy on the street, it's been cut with baking powder or icing sugar. But not this shit." He points to the diminishing pile of coke. "Want some?" He asks me. "No thanks" I say. "I, ah, have to drive" I say, taking a sip of my diet coke. Jim begins his third line and there's a knock at the door. "Be right out" he shouts as he tidily scoops the rest of the coke back into the tiny envelope. He looks up at the mirror and I notice his eyes are suddenly red and bloodshot. "Fuck" he says, splashing cool water on his face and quickly dries off his hands. "Wants some Xanax?" he asks me. "I think I'm going to pass on that too" I say. We part ways.
Jim is among the 1.9 million Cocaine addicts in North America alone. Approximately 400,000 of them are hard core crack addicts. While the elite rich tend to use Cocaine, the poor within North America fall into the sad legacy of crack cocaine addiction. Crack, an intensely strong version of coke which has been cooked and purified, their addiction can begin right from the first hit.
Few people have managed to kick crack once they succumb to this drug. The majority of addicts will move to other drugs such as Heroin, Crystal Meth or Prescription drugs such as Demerol, Morphine, or Oxycontin. All of these drugs trigger an intense dumping of dopamine from the brain, causing the user to experience an intense euphoria. This euphoria is what all drug addicts try to attain once they've become chemically dependent on drugs.
The allure of cheap street drugs is a constant threat to everyone. With Crystal Meth being created in back yards and even in vehicles, these toxic laboratories are extremely dangerous to everyone. The chemicals involved in making Crystal Meth is very toxic and any house that has been condemned by being a drug lab is usually placed on the EPA toxic site list.
Addictive Potential
The addictive potential of a drug varies from substance to substance, and from individual to individual. Dose, frequency, pharmacokinetics of a particular substance, route of administration, and time are critical factors for developing a drug addiction.An article in The Lancet compared the harm and addiction of 20 drugs, using a scale from 0 to 3 for physical addiction, psychological addiction, and pleasure to create a mean score for addiction. Caffeine was not included in the study. Selected results can be seen in the chart below.
Comments