The Dangers and Risks of Cocaine - What You Need to Know

Cocaine hydrochloride is a stimulant for the central nervous system, which ? scientifically speaking ? interferes with your body''s ability to reabsorb dopamine, a chemical neurotransmitter inside your body that allows you to experience pleasure and movement. Cocaine can be snorted, smoked, or even injected right into the bloodstream, and while each method produces slightly different durations of its effect, each is just as dangerous ? and addictive ? as the next.

When you take cocaine, your body produces extra amounts of dopamine but is also inhibited from reabsorbing it, causing over-stimulation in the brain. This is what causes its hallucinogenic effects, such as: euphoria, extra alertness, false overconfidence, and hyper-stimulation. Although users report feeling exhilarated while on the drug, the effects will wear off quickly ? and withdrawal symptoms begin almost immediately. These include, but are not limited to: anxiety, insomnia, depression, paranoia, irritability, and in some cases, literal physical pain.

Since coming down from a cocaine high can be painful, users are often led to take more cocaine in an attempt to lessen the symptoms. This quickly leads to addiction and long-term use, which will merely result in more severe withdrawal symptoms when an individual is not high on the drug.

Cocaine gives users a false sense of confidence and security, and for this reason, it is highly dangerous to do things like operate a motor vehicle while on the drug. The stimulants in cocaine also tend to reduce a user''s judgment for alcohol consumption, leaving the user far more intoxicated than he thought, once the drug''s effects wear off. This kind of mixing puts physical strain on one''s heart and liver, potentially causing vomiting, respiratory failure, and blackouts.

Long-term users of cocaine risk a number of serious health problems that will eventually become fatal, including: an irregular heartbeat and heart failure, chronic insomnia, psychosis and severe depression, seizures and brain hemorrhaging, and respiratory failure. Regardless of whatever short-term benefits users believe they will get from using cocaine, the addictive properties and fatal results of usage are not worth the risk.

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