Cocaine

[chimney]

Has tere been any conclusive proof that cocaine use leads to mental health problems later in life?

[Drusilla]

This site has interesting information, whether it's conclusive in all cases may depend how much you do/don't want to believe.

http://www.emedicine.com/med/topic3116.htm#section~introduction

Best wishes.

[sarah_louise]

That is a bit like saying is there conclusive proof that sticking your hand in a coffee grinder will it do any harm.

Cocaine - like most drugs - acts on neurotransmitters in the body. These are chemical messengers that send signals between one nerve cell and an adjacent one. Some neurotransmitters switch nerve cells on - or speed them up, some switch nerve cells off - or slow them down. If any chemical - such as a drug - interferes with these neurotransmitters, this can have all sorts of consequences. The risk to mental health of using cocaine is high. Regular use can lead to anxiety, paranoia and psychosis - which can sometimes produce permanent mental health problems.

[ll_billym]

It really depends on the amount of cocaine consumed. If you do enough it will lead to the kind of mental health problems outlined by sarah_louise in early life let alone later on. If you only do one line in your entire life then it will not affect you at all. The amount of cocaine needed to develop problems will be different for everyone.

To look at the question in a different light, if you do enough cocaine mental health problems will start occuring at some point and continue from that point until you stop doing cocaine when they will probably start to lessen and if you are lucky stop completely.

That is to say that there is very little chance of doing cocaine from say age 20-25 and suddenly get mental problems age 50.

[Lollyhoney]

If you ask me, you'd need to have mental problems to take it in the first place.

[boobesque]

there is no conclusive proof. there is corelatory proof. perhaps the people who are pre-disposed to mental health problems are also pre-disposed to find cocaine appealing. to find conclusive evidence you would need to choose several people at random (not from a group of volunteers. maybe those people who would volunteer are also predisposed to yade yade ya...) and give them cocaine at whatever intervals you are studying. if all of them develop mental health problems then you have near conclusive proof. this would however be very unethical and very unlikely.

[qapmoc]

This sounds like the kind of experiment that the US govt would have tried out on its own troops in the past, I would not be surprised if there is secret follow up of long term effects in place ''at this very time''

[Bob A Job]

Im my experience, people who regularly use cocaine suffer from one major problem,
Having to be around people who use cocaine.
its a antisocial drug as anyone taking it bores the pants off anyone sober. Having done just about anything there was going when i was younger, I learned one important thing.

Taking mind altering drugs and spending time in the same boring pubs/clubs is no substitue for a group of good interesting friends, with sports/hobbies/interests in common. All you end up with is less money in your pocket and virtually no memory of you so called good nights.

[devilhunter]

I believe that it does depend on the person.
I know people both men and women who do it most weekends and are in no way what I would calI "in trouble with it".
They just prefer it to drinking to excess and almost all do it as a social thing in their own houses etc.
A good example is a poker night when some will be aound and everone will have a line at various points in the night.