Cocaine is a horrible drug and u should never do it?

Answer 1

Cocaine could only be taken in leaf form until about 1860. The natural source gives a low dose of cocaine with effects similar to drinking strong coffee. People who chew coca leaves do not often have a serious addiction problem because there is so little cocaine in each leaf. However, in 1858-1860 cocaine was isolated from the plant material by chemist Albert Niemann at the University of Gottingen in Germany. Shortly after this form of purification was discovered, people began to inhale it (snort) and to inject it.

Coca leaves are stripped from the plant and crushed, chopped, and/or pounded and mixed with a solution of alcohol, gasoline, kerosene, or some other solvent that will separate the cocaine from the leaves. The resulting liquid contains unpurified cocaine alkaloids and may additionally contain waxy material from the leaves. This waxy material can be removed by heating and then cooling the mixture, a process that solidifies the unwanted wax. The next step is to isolate the cocaine alkaloids from the liquid. This is done with acid and basic mixtures. The alkaloids that are removed in this process are then treated with kerosene. The kerosene is removed and gas crystals of crude cocaine are left at the bottom of the tank. Typically, the crystals are dissolved in methyl alcohol. They are then recrystallized and dissolved in sulfuric acid, which results in cocaine that is about 60% pure.

It should be noted that cocaine at this point is basically freebase cocaine, very similar to crack. In fact, when a person freebases cocaine, or makes crack, they are reversing what is done in the next process. What is done next is converting freebase cocaine to a salt called cocaine hydrochloride (regular cocaine). The reasons for converting it to a salt are:

1) If the cocaine was left in this form for long it would lose its potency.

2) To make it water soluble (it does not dissolve well in water unless converted to cocaine hydrochloride). The drug (in hydrochloride form) can be used for injecting or snorting into the bloodstream. Blood is about 50 percent water, any drug which is injected into the human body must be dissolvable in water. If it is not, it will float around in the body in a non dissolved clump. Such clumps are likely to cause strokes or cardiac arrest (heart attack). Because of factors like these cocaine is further treated with oxidizing agents to produce a water-soluble form of the drug. This is usually done by further washing, oxidation and separation procedures that involve potassium permanganate, benzole, and sodium carbonate. The result is an odorless, white crystalline powder. It has a bitter, numbing taste.

Source: http://www.a1b2c3.com/drugs/coc08.htm