Most Cocaine cut with de-worming drug
Cocaine’s a hell of a drug, and even more so when laced with another drug that’s commonly used to deworm opossums. Federal agents have found that 69 percent of cocaine shipments seized entering the United States contain levamisole, a veterinary drug linked to serious weakening of the immune system in humans. Here’s the real funny part: no one knows why.
This comes from a recent report by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) on the immune system condition, known as agranulocytosis. The paper tracks 21 cases from New Mexico and Washington State linked to cocaine, including one death, but cautions that many more cases have probably gone under the radar of public health officials.
Found by Kerry Lutz.
Scare tactic or another way to kill off the population??
If this was happening, Wouldnt it be a big concern in other countries also??
Obviously the FDA is failing in it’s responsibility to regulate the illegal cocaine business. Bush would never have allowed this. (snnooort.) Obama fails again.
Excuse me…who deworms opossums? Granny Clampett?
And if you did need to deworm an opossum, wouldn’t the regular stuff for dogs work just as well?
This story is fishier than Monica’s dress!
Lowers the immune system…making it easier to catch swine-flu? C’mon John your falling down on the Conspiracy angle!
@#4 http://www.annals.org/content/150/4/287.short
@#5 http://cancerres.aacrjournals.org/cgi/content/abstract/36/3/952
Why doesn’t Uncle Sam capture drug shipments, then lace the drugs with some mildly toxic marker, then re-release the drugs back into the supply chain (with no one the wiser)? Then, when people show up with strange illnesses, charge them with drug use.
Oh, I guess that’s what’s happening here.
#4: [i]Excuse me…who deworms opossums? Granny Clampett?[/i]
Exactly what I was thinking …
I don’t ever recall trying to stick my worm in a possum.
“deworm opossums” ???
I guess that accounts for why the coke whore I hired had developed a marsupial pouch and four extra nipples. But at least the diarrhea she left behind didn’t have any crawlies in it…
This partially confirms the suspicions of Dr. Peter Duesberg, the infamous professor of molecular and cell biology at the University of California, Berkeley. Duesberg says that the major cause of the weakening of the immune system in the United States and Europe is the heavy use of recreational drugs, not the virus called HIV.
Only a government would adulterate drugs with toxic substances or anything that isn’t incredibly cheap. If it is bad manufacturing (stupidity) that is different.
In the 1980s the cocaine that came to Colorado, at least, was remarkably pure. American Dealers cut it with inosotol (sic) which is a B Vitamin and a baby laxative that makes you fart. They used it because it was cheap and looked like good coke, or at least, could blend well with good coke.
Same thing goes with meth too, its already a bad drug but a lot of stuff use to make it got regulated and banned hard to get, people start to find alternative and now its even worst then it ever was.
Sounds like BS from the just say No camp.
I don’t want to take cocaine. The rest of you are free to take it. Repeal the laws against cocaine and other drugs first before acquiring your supply for personal use. Then maybe those of us who don’t like illegal drugs can be free to buy cold medicine and get our Forth Amendment rights back when we drive our cars.
Excellent! Now use this stuff to lace all the pot and we’ll have a solution for dumb primates that want to use drugs as toys.
Cursor_
This story has more holes in it than Swiss Cheese.
Who in the hell deworms opossums?
According to Wikipedia, the drug is used treat roundworm in freshwater tropical fish.
I think this is a scare tactic by the DEA. There may be a grain of truth to this, a sample of coke was found cut with this drug. Then some idiot did some piss-poor math and projected these insane numbers.
>> yanikinwaoz said, on December 22nd, 2009 at 7:22 am
>> Who in the hell deworms opossums?
John is losing it.
Did you check the original post? It’s some goofy blog.
The original story is from Wall Street Journal.
Here is the un-doctoried lead sentence:
“A drug approved to treat cancer and used to de-worm animals is being added to the nation’s cocaine supply.”
(There is an opossum reference lower in the article but it’s a quote meant to be ironic.)
Although I’m not a pro-legalized drug advocate, it seems to me that this illustrates a good reason why drugs should be legalized.
It’s similar to the needle exchange logic — “People are going to abuse drugs, anyway, it might as well be as safe as possible.”
This is a fairly compelling argument, IMHO.
#19 Greg Allen: “People are going to abuse drugs, anyway, it might as well be as safe as possible.”
“This is a fairly compelling argument, IMHO.”
Greg – Would that extend to: “People are gonna kill people, anyway, might as well give them guns to make it as quick as possible”?
Not suggesting you are wrong but just supposing…
Animby you missed the point completely. Greg said make it as safe as possible, not as quick as possible, and he didn’t say as easy as possible either. Making murder safer might include issuing nerf guns to murderers or just getting them to therapy before they kill.
You accuse Greg of bad logic but you are guilty of not understanding what you read.
>> Animby said, on December 22nd, 2009 at 11:05 am
>> Greg – Would that extend to: “People are gonna kill people, anyway, might as well give them guns to make it as quick as possible”?
Fair enough. You are making the “logical extension” argument which has its limit when it come to the real world and especially social issues.
The thing is — killing someone else is a very different moral issue than abusing oneself.
This touches on the legalized drug issue. I think you can make a pretty compelling logical extension from alcohol to pot.
But I (and I would guess a whole lot of people) have a harder time making that extension all the way to crack or meth. They just seem very different.