by David Aaron White

Created on: May 27, 2008   Last Updated: June 17, 2009

Crack is a form of cocaine that hasn't been neutralized by a salt to make hydrochloric salt. It is used as a very strong and addictive stimulant to give users a "high." Crack emerged as an abused substance in the 1980's, but its history dates much further back in time. See, cocaine comes from the coca plant, and in many Indian cultures, coca plant leaves were regarded as mystical and religious, and were even used as a measure of timeit wasn't uncommon for a native traveler to use the number of mouthfuls of coca he chewed to explain how long a journey had taken. And before Christopher Columbus voyaged to the New World, coca was reserved by the Incas for their chieftains. Later on, in the early 1800's, it was referred to as the "Elixir of Life" (in a powder form) because some people believed that they could use it as a substitute for a month's worth of food.

The drug is cocaine that has been processed with baking soda or ammonia and formed into a "rock" that is smoked. Since the 1970's, crack has been produced in a rock form, and is much cheaper to develop than cocaine in a powder form. Because crack is a stimulant, it increases the user's heart rate, temperature and blood pressure, and also dilates pupils. When smoked, crack can give the user a high of 5-10 minutes, whereas snorting crack can give the user a high of 15-30 minutes. Crack cocaine interferes with the reabsorption of dopamine, which creates feelings of pleasure while affecting the user's ability to move. Though it had been used in colonial and pre-colonial times as a medicine to stave off fatigue and hunger, crack is now used for the high it produces. It is very dangerous, like most stimulants, because no matter how frequently or in what quantity it is used, it can cause cardiovascular emergencies such as constricted blood vessels, and also is a perpetrator of respiratory discomfort, nausea, seizures, and severe abdominal pain.
The faster that someone intakes crack increases how high they will get, but also shortens the time that they will actually feel the high. Because of this, crack users develop tolerance and addiction relatively quickly compared to users of other drugs. Most users prefer to smoke crack rather than snort it because this delivers the drug directly to the lungs, immediately creating a high along with initiating the drug's other effects. In addition to being a dangerous drug on its own, when mixed with alcohol crack cocaine produces a substance called cocaethylene, which magnifies

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