Cocaine Purity impacts on drug trends

Release is concerned about the impact that low purity cocaine will have on the drug scene in general. The staff on the drugs team, who regularly provide expert testimony at Court, are increasingly seeing cases involving large cocaine seizures where purity can be as low as 3%-4% purity and is on average about 15%. The cost of purchasing on the street is about £40 per gram.

As such many long term recreational stimulant users are not purchasing coke – this is confirmed by calls on the Release National Helpline. Whilst it could be argued that this decrease in purity could be linked to successful law enforcement it is more likely that greed is the real motivator behind this change. Often cocaine powder is being stamped and re-stamped into blocks, being continuously cut, so that the numbing effect traditionally associated with cocaine is now more often the benzocaine or lignocaine used as cutting agents.

Gary Sutton, Head of Drugs at Release states: ‘In my opinion, it is an effect of the recession that we have experienced a lengthening of the supply chain as cocaine passes through more hands from importer to consumer. In a situation not unfamiliar to viewers of ‘The Wire’ we are beginning to see that as benefits become less available to young people and as the availability of work constricts that selling cocaine is seen by as an attractive alternative to unemployment or a MacJob’.

This drop in purity may mean some people are choosing to use other drugs such as Ketamine; mephedrone and other various legal highs. However, it likely that weak cocaine will open the way for methamphetamine – and we will finally witness what has been predicted for years. Not because it is the natural next step in drug use patterns but because when supplies of one drug dry up, people will generally seek out an alternative and, unfortunately, in most cases this will involve a drug that causes much greater harm.