Britain has worse cocaine habit than Colombia – Epidemic is worst in Europe and fuelled by binge drinking culture, experts warn, as drug can be ordered as easily as a takeaway pizza
by ByGollie
Britain has worse cocaine habit than Colombia – Epidemic is worst in Europe and fuelled by binge drinking culture, experts warn, as drug can be ordered as easily as a takeaway pizza
by ByGollie
16 comments
It can? How would someone go about ordering some? Just so I know what not to do.
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> #Britain has worse cocaine habit than Colombia
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> **Epidemic is worst in Europe and fuelled by binge drinking culture, experts warn, as drug can be ordered as easily as a takeaway pizza**
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> *Laura Donnelly, Health Editor 22 December 2023 • 6:00pm*
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> Britain has the worst cocaine habit in Europe, with rates of consumption much higher than Mexico and Colombia, international data show.
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> Experts warned of an epidemic in its use, fuelled by the UK’s binge drinking culture.
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> They said the drug could be ordered as easily as a pizza, and was as likely to be snorted at a pub or wine bar as at a football match.
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> Research from the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) shows that the UK is now second only to Australia for use globally.
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> The annual figures show 2.7 per cent of adults aged 15 to 64 use the drug in the UK – the highest figure of 27 countries in Europe.
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> The figure for the UK is higher than for the US and far above levels of consumption in major drug trafficking countries.
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> In Britain, men were twice as likely as women to take the drug, with 3.6 per cent using it, against 1.6 per cent of women.
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> Those in the UK were four times as likely as those in Colombia to take cocaine, with a figure of 0.6 per cent and three times as likely as those in Mexico, where the rate is 0.8 per cent.
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> https://i.imgur.com/HEABzZ4.png
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> The UK rates are also more than twice the average of 1.2 per cent across the 38 OECD developed Western nations that were analysed.
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> Only Australia exceeds Britain’s cocaine habit, with 4.2 per cent of adults consuming the drug, according to the figures.
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> Dr Niall Campbell, the lead addiction consultant psychiatrist at the Priory Hospital, Roehampton, said the drug had become increasingly socially acceptable.
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> He said: “Cocaine use is pretty much an epidemic at the moment. It’s everywhere, it’s not a drug of the moneyed classes anymore, everybody wants it. They’re all fuelling the criminal empire.
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> “We talk to people at all levels of society. From those on building sites having ‘builder’s coke’, to people paying £5,000 at a time for the pure stuff. If you go to a football match at half time there’s a queue of young men going into the loo to use cocaine.
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> “Alcohol is the number one reason for admissions to our residential addiction unit, and cocaine and alcohol is the second reason. Cocaine and alcohol always go together – it enables you to drink more.
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> “It’s just a routine part of a night out. People have a couple of pints, then ring the dealer. It’s as quick to get cocaine as it is to order a pizza.”
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> Bern, the capital of Switzerland, is considering legalising the sale of cocaine for recreational use because consumption is so rife. The move for a world-first pilot scheme is being advocated by Left-wing politicians who claim the “war on drugs has failed”.
> Cocaine use fuels A&E visits every day
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> Experts said the consequences of the drug were being seen in hospitals across the UK.
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> Dr Campbell said: “Every day in A&E someone will come in with an irregular heartbeat caused by cocaine,” he said.
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> “You get older guys having a meet-up with the lads who have a binge on cocaine and they don’t make it. Their hearts can handle it in their 20s or 30s but they can’t as they get old.”
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> https://i.imgur.com/gXJyMhV.png
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> Ian Hamilton, an associate professor of addiction at the University of York, said the drug had become far more available and potent, with the price falling relative to income.
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> “Cocaine is better value than it’s ever been,” he said. “In the UK, £10 to £20 would buy you a reasonable amount of cocaine, enough for a few lines for a night out. That’s the price of a cocktail, or a couple of pints.”
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> Prof Hamilton said it was now being used by all classes and ages, with use among women catching up with that of men.
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> He said: “Most people don’t access cocaine through a dealer, it’s through a friend or an acquaintance.”
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> Some people even use the drug at work in an attempt to increase concentration and energy.
> Calls for public health campaign
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> Prof Hamilton called for a public health campaign to alert people to the risks of the drug, with adverts in public lavatories, wine bars and sports grounds.
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> As well as a risk of overdosing, the drug can cause heart and respiratory problems, and dependence.
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> A 2020 government review of the UK’s £10 billion drugs market found a sharp rise in illegal drug use
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> In 2020, a government review of the UK’s £10 billion drugs market found a sharp rise in illegal drug use, particularly among the middle classes.
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> The review led by Dame Carol Black, a medic, found that four in 10 of those consuming cocaine earned more than £40,000 a year, with a 25 per cent rise in drug use in five years.
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> Cocaine accounted for a fifth of the total £9.6 billion drugs market, with white men under 30 blamed by the review for the surge.
> Cocaine users do not ‘necessarily think they are addicts’
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> Dame Carol said it was often bought through friends, online or at dinner parties and taken in a “sanitised way” where people did not “necessarily think they were addicts” and were unlikely to know its supply into the UK was dominated by ruthless Albanian gangs.
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> Since then the Government has commissioned the Advisory Council on the Misuse of Drugs, its independent expert advisory body, to conduct a review into the driving forces behind young people’s cocaine use.
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> Data from the same OECD report – called Health at a Glance – shows that British women are the worst in the developed world for binge drinking, sharing the top of the leaderboard with Denmark, with men fourth from top.
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> A Home Office spokesman said: “Our 10-year drug strategy, backed by a record £3 billion of investment, is tackling the supply of illicit drugs whilst building a world-class system of treatment for those who abuse drugs to help turn their life around.
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> “This is a whole-of-government strategy and we are committed to supporting people who suffer from the clutches of addiction and the vulnerable people who are exploited by gangs to fuel their violent trade.”
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In my experience atleast part of the problem is that all the bars close at 1. If you need to get fucked fast cocaine is the way to go.
Can someone please ELI5 how do people buy expensive drugs in this economy? I know people who cannot afford to heat their whole apartment and here we’re talking of an epidemic? I don’t get it.
Colombians don’t do coke, they just make it so that comparison is silly.
Regardless, I don’t understand how it’s an “epidemic”. There aren’t countless people dying from it like fentanyl or ending up on the streets from it like heroin. It’s literally just people using it to party.
Epidemic makes it sound like something terrible, but it’s just people enjoying themselves. Alcohol is more dangerous and damaging than cocaine and yet it’s completely normalized everywhere. Explain that.
I can explain the epidemic perfectly.
A) It’s readily available and always has been
B1) the UK is experience a severe decrease in the sense of agency and general wellbeing in its society which has culminated as a result of steadily rising social deprivation and huge cuts to community stabilising services.
B2) the decrease in the feeling of agency results in cocaine’s amplifying effects of feeling powerful, self assured and competent. It’s addictive beyond belief because it can make the smallest imp sack of shite person feel like they are doing the right thing, making the right impression and handling life rather well.
C) it is much easier to self indulge when the world around you is turning into a shit hole as a form of escapism. Binge culture is steeped into British capitalistic values. Save for the week so you can splurge on the weekend. The more time you spend around them the easier it is to see.
I left the UK after 16 years because all my friends were far and beyond custard fucking gannets for cocaine. I watched it change their mentality and their treatment of others until the next weekend and next bag was the most important thing. It’s a shit drug that empowers people with falsehoods and imaginary ideas. A world of dreams of unique self empowerment at the expense of all other external factors. Funny the politicians are all on coke because geopolitically that’s what the UK has done also.
Who’s sharing? I want
That’s horrible!!
I’ll be staying in Edinburgh in October. Where is this? I need to put my nose to the mirror and get to the bottom of this.
really!? I wanna order some cocaine. where do I call!?
The fuck with australia
Why exactly is cocaine a bigger issue than alcohol?
London has been declared the new drug capital as of winter 2022
Was letze Prais?
As a Colombian let me clarify something; Colombia doesn’t use the drugs it produces, most of them are exported to US and Europe. Now we have a severe drug addiction problem but coke and heroin are far to expensive for the average drug user (except in the wealthier cities like Medellin and Bogota). Believe it or not poor people drugs are the subproducts of the drug making process like Bazuco or glue sniffing.
Of course, because being a louzy human beign is the ultimate sign of empowerment.
Bruh, I read “Berlin” first and I thought we were back in the 1920s.