Crack
cocaine is the freebase form of cocaine that can be smoked. It may also be termed rock, hard, iron, cavvy, base, or just crack.
Addiction.
Crack cocaine is popularly thought to be the most addictive form of cocaine,and one of the most addictive forms of any drug.
However, this claim has been contested: Morgan and Zimmer wrote that available data indicated that “…smoking cocaine by itself does not increase markedly the likelihood of dependence…. The claim that cocaine is much more addictive when smoked must be reexamined.”
They argued that cocaine users who are already prone to abuse are most likely to “move toward a more efficient mode of ingestion” (that is, smoking). The intense desire to recapture the initial high is what is so addictive for many users.
Purer forms of crack cocaine will produce the feeling of euphoria: even after smoking diluted or fake crack for hours, one hit of real crack will produce euphoria. Hours of misery or tweaking can be reversed with one single hit of real crack. The memory of that type of high can cause addicts to buy large amounts of street crack, hoping for the real thing.
On the other hand, Reinarman et al. wrote that the nature of crack addiction depends on the social context in which it is used and the psychological characteristics of users, pointing out that many heavy crack users go for days or weeks without using the drugs.
Crack powder cocaine sentence guidelines adjusted.
The Associated Press. Friday, October 15, 2010; 5:49 PM. WASHINGTON — Federal sentencing guidelines have been revised to conform to a law that reduced a wide gap between prison terms for crack cocaine and powder cocaine convictions.
The U.S. Sentencing Commission voted 6-1 Friday to approve a temporary amendment to federal guidelines.
Earlier this year, Congress passed the Fair Sentencing Act. It changed a 25-year-old law that authorized the same mandatory prison term for having 5 grams of crack cocaine as for possessing 500 grams, or 100 times more, powder cocaine. Critics said the old law discriminated against blacks, who outnumbered whites among crack users.
The new law reduced the ratio to 18-1 and eliminated mandatory sentences for possessing less than 28 grams of crack cocaine.
A permanent amendment must be submitted to Congress by May.
In purer forms, crack rocks appear as off-white nuggets with jagged edges, with a slightly higher density than candle wax. Purer forms of crack resemble a hard brittle plastic, in crystalline form (snaps when broken).
A crack rock acts as a local anesthetic, numbing the tongue or mouth only where directly placed. When smoked, crack can leave the tongue numb where the smoke enters the mouth. Purer forms of crack will sink in water or melt at the edges when near a flame (crack vaporizes at 90 °C, 194 °F).
Crack cocaine as sold on the streets may be adulterated or “buffed” to increase bulk. According to Cpl. Kent Dahl, with Red Deer RCMP Federal Drugs, Canada, white substances mimicking the appearance of cocaine are added to increase bulk. Use of toxic adulterants such as levamisole has been documented.
Crack cocaine, often nicknamed “crack” after the sound made during its manufacture and when smoked, appeared primarily in impoverished inner-city neighborhoods in New York, Los Angeles, and Miami in late 1984 and 1985.
Because of the dangers for manufacturers of using ether to produce pure freebase cocaine, producers began to omit the step of removing the freebase precipitate from the ammonia mixture.
Typically, filtration processes are also omitted. The end result is that the cut, in addition to the ammonium salt (NH4Cl), remains in the freebase cocaine after the mixture has evaporated. The “rock” that is thus formed also contains a small amount of water.
Baking soda is a base used in preparation of crack, although other weak bases may substitute for it. The net reaction when using sodium bicarbonate (NaHCO3, common baking soda) is Coc-H+Cl– + NaHCO3 → Coc + H2O + CO2 + NaCl.
Crack cocaine is usually purchased already in rock form, although it is not uncommon for some users to “wash up” or “cook” the cocaine into crack themselves. This process is done with baking soda (sodium bicarbonate), water, and a spoon.
Once mixed and heated, the bicarbonate breaks down into carbon dioxide and sodium carbonate, which then reacts with the hydrochloride of the cocaine molecule, leaving cocaine as an oily free base.
Once separated from the hydrochloride, the cocaine alkaloid floats to the top of the now leftover liquid. It is at this point that the oil is picked up rapidly, usually with a pin or long thin object. This pulls the oil up and spins it, allowing air to set and dry the oil, and allows the user and/or maker to roll the oil into the rock-like shape.
Crack vaporizes near temperature 90 °C (194 °F), much lower than the cocaine hydrochloride melting point of 190 °C (374 °F). Whereas cocaine hydrochloride cannot be smoked (burns with no effect), crack cocaine when smoked allows for quick absorption into the blood stream, and reaches the brain in 8 seconds.
Coupled with the fact that crack is considered more potent than cocaine hydrochloride, users obtain an intense high much more quickly than with the normal method of insufflating (“sniffing” or “snorting”) the powdered cocaine.
Psychological effects
Crack cocaine is a substance that affects the brain chemistry of the user: causing euphoria, supreme confidence, loss of appetite, insomnia, alertness, increased energy, a craving for more cocaine, and potential paranoia (ending after use).
Its initial effect is to release a large amount of dopamine, a brain chemical inducing feelings of euphoria. The high usually lasts from 5–10 minutes, after which time dopamine levels in the brain plummet, leaving the user feeling depressed and low. When cocaine is dissolved and injected, the absorption into the bloodstream is at least as rapid as the absorption of the drug which occurs when crack cocaine is smoked, and similar euphoria may be experienced.
A typical response among users is to have another hit of the drug; however, the levels of dopamine in the brain take a long time to replenish themselves, and each hit taken in rapid succession leads to increasingly less intense highs.
However, a person might binge for 3 or more days without sleep, while partying with hits from the pipe.
Use of cocaine in a binge, during which the drug is taken repeatedly and at increasingly high doses, leads to a state of increasing irritability, restlessness, and paranoia. This may result in a full-blown paranoid psychosis, in which the individual loses touch with reality and experiences auditory hallucinations.
Stimulant drug abuse (particularly amphetamine and cocaine) can lead to delusional parasitosis (aka Ekbom’s Syndrome: a mistaken belief they are infested with parasites). For example, excessive cocaine use can lead to formication, nicknamed “cocaine bugs” or “coke bugs,” where the affected people believe they have, or feel, parasites crawling under their skin. These delusions are also associated with high fevers or extreme alcohol withdrawal, often together with visual hallucinations about insects.
People experiencing these hallucinations might scratch themselves to the extent of serious skin damage and bleeding, especially when they are delirious.
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