Cocaine Questions and Answers
Street terms for cocaine: blow, nose candy, snowball, tornado, wicky stick1
What are the different forms of cocaine?
- White crystalline powder
- "Crack" or "rock" cocaine is an off-white chunky material.
How is cocaine used?
- Powder cocaine is generally snorted or dissolved in water and injected.
- Crack cocaine is usually smoked.2
Who uses cocaine?
- Cocaine is the second most commonly used illicit drug in the United States.
- About 10 percent of Americans over the age of 12 have tried cocaine at least once in their lifetime, about 2 percent have tried crack, and nearly one percent is currently using cocaine.3
How does cocaine get to the United States?
- The United States-Mexico border is the primary point of entry for cocaine shipments being smuggled into the United States.
- Organized crime groups based in Colombia control the worldwide supply of cocaine.4
How much does cocaine cost?
- Cocaine prices depend upon the purity of the product.
- In 2001, cocaine purity declined by 8 percent, from 86 percent pure in 1998 to a 78 percent pure in 2001. The decrease in purity indicates a decrease in the supply of cocaine in the United States.5
- Cocaine remained low and stable, which suggests a steady supply to the United States.
- Nationwide, prices ranged from $12,000 to $35,000 per kilogram.6
What are some consequences of cocaine use?
- Cocaine is powerfully addictive.7
- Smoking crack can cause severe chest pains with lung trauma and bleeding.8
- The mixing of cocaine and alcohol create coca ethylene while increasing risk of sudden death.9
- Cocaine-related deaths are often a result of cardiac arrest or seizures followed by respiratory arrest.10
How long does cocaine stay in the body?
- Some people who are interested in the answer to this question are concerned about passing a drug test. And this is a very difficult question to answer accurately. Cocaine, because it is water-soluble, travels through the body rather quickly. The general rule of thumb is 1 to 7 days, depending upon the size and metabolism of the person. It can also be affected by how much cocaine was ingested over what time period. As far as passing a drug test is concerned, there is no guaranteed
right amount of time either. It would depend largely upon the above-mentioned variable and the type and sophistication of the test. Cocaine could be detected in the hair follicles, for example, for as long as the hair had been growing.
1 Office of National Drug Control Policy, Street Terms: Drugs and the Drug Trade.
2 National Institute on Drug Abuse, Infofax: Crack and Cocaine, October 2001.
3 Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration, Summary of Findings from the 2000 National Household Survey on Drug Abuse, September 2001.
4 Drug Enforcement Administration, Drug Trafficking in the United States, September 2001.
5 Drug Enforcement Administration, STRIDE Report, August 2002.
6 Office of National Drug Control Policy, Pulse Check: Trends in Drug Abuse, November 2001.
7 Office of National Drug Control Policy, Drug Facts: Cocaine, May 2002.
8 Drug Enforcement Administration, Drug Descriptions: Cocaine.
9 National Institute on Drug Abuse, Infofax: Crack and Cocaine, October 2001.
10 Office of National Drug Control Policy, Drug Facts: Cocaine, May 2002.
reprinted from DEA gov’t website
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