DPA Drug Policy Alliance 2019 Proposal: Nicotine Versus Cocaine 1906+ Disaster!

Nicotine v Cocaine 1906+ Disaster

Douglas A. Willinger

“one of the recommendations from the project was to examine a key factor that shapes U.S. drug research: the pervasive belief that some drugs are inherently harmful and addictive, a position that influences research questions and populations studied, as well as the outcomes that are measured.”

This pervasive belief dates back in U.S. national legislation to the 1906 Food and Drugs Act.

It was widely lauded for its task of stopping the interstate commerce in “adulterated” and “misbranded” products sold as foods or drugs, as an “progressive” act of consumer protectionism.  

But, alas, it was seriously flawed and biased, a proverbial wolf in sheep’s clothes, cleverly written to enable anti-competitive regulatory abuse favoritism for key agricultural commodities.  

It did not prohibit any substance fought by the “drug war”.  

It introduced the idea of labeling ingredients, but only in a fashion designed to convey the idea of a set of essentially blacklisted substances, via the 1906 Act’s enumerated list - morphine, opium, cocaine, heroin, alpha or beta eucaine, chloroform, cannabis indica, chloral hydrate, or acetanilide. 

As this list is limited it for instance conveys the a likely impression to potential and actual consumers that such are intrinsically more worrisome than those unlisted, such as say caffeine and nicotine.  

It established a bureaucratic regulatory dictatorship to establish what was “legitimate” concerning not only foods and drugs, but also medical practice; and committed the mortal sin of granting such regulatory authority to the Bureau of Chemistry of the U.S.D.A. without any requirement of science credibility; hence it was under this sort of initial legislative direction that we the people got a wolf in sheep’s clothing, as a tool of longstanding dominant economic interests to use the power of the expanding “progressive” state to suppress their market competition.   AKA cigarette protectionism.

To wit, Opium and Coca Leaf.

Opium is the classic “narcotic”, a drug inducing sleep.  An effective pain killer and even anti-depressant.  Physically addictive, and because of its utility and relative lack of toxicity, is adaptable to higher and higher doses via the then recent – later 1800s – developed practices of refining plants into powders, creating ultra-concentrated HC. forms of alkaloids found in the plant matter in minute quantities.  Hence, drinking or eating Opium, or Opium infusion – tea – was far less addicting than an injected alkaloids, say morphine or its man-modified form heroin.

Coca leaf, which contains the alkaloid cocaine akin to Coffee containing the alkaloid caffeine and Tobacco leaf nicotine, has an ancient history of use in South America, particularly the Andean mountain areas, as in and near Peru, routinely served to tourists to help acclimate them to the high altitude conditions.  Europeans first encountered Coca leaf about the same time as Tobacco, yet Coca was hampered due to its volatility – it more easily went stale – making it a less desirable shipping commodity, thus delaying its market penetration within Europe for 300+ years, to the creation and marketing of Vin Mariani and its widespread medical use for the half century leading up to its 1914 U.S. prohibition.  Vin Mariani was a “wine of coca” made with an extract blending three varieties of Coca leaves.  It contained roughly 6 or 7 mg of cocaine alkaloid per fluid ounce.  It inspired numerous competing coca wine products, eventually including non alcoholic beverages that became known as soft drinks, such as Coca Cola with reportedly 1 1/2 milligrams per fluid ounce .  It also came with products pattered after traditional uses of Tobacco, with cigars, cheroots and cigarettes made with Coca leaves.

These sort of uses of “cocaine” were comparable to that of caffeine in Coffee, nicotine in Tobacco.

Concentrated cocaine was only first made commercially available as pharmaceutical forms about 1885 via Merck, in Germany, and Parke Davis, in the U.S., in salt (hydrochloride) and freebase (sulfate) varieties, dry or in solutions for injection.  Uses of 89% pure cocaine powder (HCI), and solutions of lesser concentration though meant for the infinitely more direct mode of administration as injections, would clearly introduce many undesirable case studies, particularly in the field of anesthesia.

There are numerous medical records concerning all of this.   

The issue became muddled with those misrepresenting acute toxicities of ultra-high doses as intrinsic to any dosage, with societies with relatively little exposure to Coca thus being susceptible to dis-information designed to spark support for the drug war.  Sadly, for its market competition being squashed by the drug war, with the USDA prosecution of beverage manufacturers for containing a supposedly dangerous, deleterious substance, the cocaine alkaloid, Tobacco cigarettes would be overwhelmingly the main daily use stimulant drug war beneficiary. 

“I have … used [Vin Mariani] to save smokers of exaggerated habits from nicotinism.  A few glasses taken in small doses … acted as a substitute for pipes and cigars because the smokers found in it the cerebral excitement which they sought in Tobacco, wholly preserving their intellectual facilities.”

The Drug Policy Alliance and allied groups need to commission a study of uses of the parent plant products Opium, Coca, in products so designed to deliver doses of opiate and/or coca alkaloids.

This DPA study should look at the health issues of relating to any displacement of existing markets in Coffee, Tea, anything else that contains caffeine, as well as those in Tobacco and anything else that contains nicotine.  Imagine particularly Coca displacing nicotine markets.

It could and should for instance ask a “what if” question regarding alternative historical possibilities, a world that did not get the drug war. 

Douglas A. Willinger
Freedom of Medicine and Diet

San Marcos, California
September 13, 2019

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I am author of papers that were published in the Drug Policy Foundation Conference compendiums, The Ever-changing, Ever-confused Popular Conception of Cocaine; Cocaine Prohibition; Water or Gasoline for the flames of drug abuse; and Onwards to Coca!

I was a panelist in the 1991 and 1992 Cocaine panels, and the 1992 panel Is America Exporting its Problems.

I organized and moderated the panel COCA '95, a Necessary Policy Alternative from Abroad.

Additional panel proposals I submitted, but which were rejected include (1994) Coca: Turning Over A New Leaf Towards Reducing Health Care Costs, (1997) Tinctures of Opium, Wines of Coca: How Prohibition Perverts Useful Substances into white powder poisons,and (2009) Agricultural Politics of Drug Policy.

I have attended every main DPF/DPA conference since 1989.

http://freedomofmedicineanddiet.blogspot.com/2012/06/douglas-andrew-willinger-angelo.html

Since 2007, I have authored a blog on drug policy related matters Freedom of Medicine and Diet.  It includes details on the polices towards Opium, opiates, Coca leaf and cocaine, as well as the formulation of the legislative and regulatory matters, dating forward from the 1906 U.S. Food and Drugs Act that empowered the USDA Chemistry Bureau dictatorial powers, lacking any requirement of underlying consistent science.

http://freedomofmedicineanddiet.blogspot.com/

http://freedomofmedicineanddiet.blogspot.com/2017/02/defeating-drug-war-requires-better.html

Points About the 'Progressive' Era War Of Drugs

Points About the 'Progressive' Era War Of Drugs as embodied by such pieces of U.S. legislation as the 1906 Food & Drugs Act ; the 1914 Harrison 'Narcotics' Tax ...

http://freedomofmedicineanddiet.blogspot.com/2011/03/drug-war-tobacco-pharma-agricultural.html

Coca Smokables FE Stewart

COCA-LEAF CIGARS AND CIGA-
RETTES.


BY F. E. STEWART, M.d., PH.G.,
(CTan o/1Syq.)
Of Philadelphia.


I have been experimenting for some time with the leaf of Erythroxylon Coca in the form of a cigar—first, for the purpose of ascertaining whether the drug would thus produce its physiological effects, and, secondly, in view of a new therapeutic application. It is too soon yet to express a positive opinion in regard to the latter, but I have had sufficient experience with them to say something about the former; and as I find that others are already commencing to enter this field, I may be excused for calling the attention of the profession at this early date, my excuse being that I wish to receive what credit may accrue from my share in their introduction.

Some time after I commenced my experiments I found that Dr. Lewis Lewis, of this city, was employing coca in the form of a cigarette, in the treatment of throat affections, with success, and, as he says that he has been using the drug in this way for nine years, he is entitled, certainly, to the credit of priority.

Dr. Lewis's cigarettes are composed partly of coca- and partly of tobacco-leaf. This has its advantages and disadvantages. Without discussing this point, however, I employed a cigar made of pure coca-leaf, with a wrapper of mild imported tobacco of fine quality, and a cigarette of pure coca-leaf containing no tobacco, wrapped with the best quality of rice paper. Those who do not object to the tobacco can use the cigars, while those who have objections to it can employ the cigarette; while for those who object to the tobacco wrapper and the paper wrapper also, I prepare a " smoking tobacco " of pure cocaleaf, without admixture of any kind, which may be smoked in a pipe.

Coca is too well known to the profession to make it necessary for anything more than the briefest description of the plant, its history, or its virtues.

The Erythroxylon Coca grows in moist and woody regions on the eastern slope of the Andes, from two thousand to ten thousand feet above the level of the sea, and is highly valued and cultivated by the natives of Peru, Chili, and Bolivia, who make great use of it as a medicine and as an article of diet. It answers as a substitute for the tea, coffee, tobacco, hashish, opium, etc., of other nations. The natives masticate the dried leaves with finely powdered chalk, or with a highly alkaline substance prepared from roasted potatoes and the ashes of various plants, and which they call llipta. It is said that its use enables them to endure fatigue and exertion for many hours, and even for several days, with but little nourishment of any other kind, and while under its influence they are said to perform prodigies of labor.

Let me compare, therefore, the action of these cigars with that said to be produced by the drug, not only by the natives, but by Bartholow, Wood, the United States Dispensatory, the National Dispensatory, and other authorities equally well known, who are investigating the properties of this remarkable drug.

First, all authorities agree that the use of coca, either in the leaf, fluid extract, or wine, is followed by a feeling of contentment and of well-being; the sense of fatigue is removed: drowsiness is experienced for a brief period, but is soon followed by wakefulness and increased mental activity. The celebrated pedestrian Weston, having learned their powers, was detected in the use of coca-leaves during one of his extraordinary feats in London. The question, then, is, does coca, smoked, produce these effects?

I have testimony as to the feeling of contentment and well-being. Dr. M.. of Wilmington, Delaware, one of the leading physicians of that State, made some experiments in this direction for me. Being thoroughly acquainted with the effects of the drug, having frequently used it in connection with his extensive practice, and often experienced its effect on himself, what he has to say must be received as of weight. At the time of the experiment which was tried upon himself he was feeling somewhat depressed—had the blues, in other words—owing to the absence of his family and the loneliness of his house without them. After dinner he smoked a couple of the cigars, with the effect that the "blues " were expelled, and he felt the exhilarating effect of the drug in the same manner as after a dose of the wine. It is his opinion that the effect of the cigars is milder than that of the wine, but he is satisfied that he experienced the peculiar power of the coca by smoking it. He will continue his experiments in other cases. *****

Personally, I have found the effect of smoking coca-leaves to bear out the statements that the drug produces a general excitation of the circulatory and nervous systems. Smoking and inhaling the smoke of one or two cigars will increase my own pulse-rate some eight or ten beats to the minute. It certainly relieves the sense of fatigue. Smoked at night, in my own case and in the cases of several of my patients, it produces wakefulness, similar to strong coffee.

The exaltation produced by it does not seem to be followed by any feeling of languor or depression. I find it a relief after a full meal, like a good tobacco cigar. It seems to impart increased vigor to the muscular system as well as to the intellect, with an indescribable feeling of satisfaction. I have never experienced any intoxicating effect from smoking it. Dr. Bartholow says that coca, as is the case with tea and coffee, acts as an indirect nutrient, by checking waste, and hence a less amount of food is found necessary to maintain the bodily functions; and it is probable that some of the constituents of coca are utilized in the economy as food, and that the retardation of tissue waste is not the sole reason why work may be done by the same person better with than without it; and I have just learned, in a letter from Messrs. Parke, Davis & Co., that "a Mr. Stevers, a citizen of Abilene, Kansas, who is afflicted with hay fever, and was about to go to the mountains, has concluded to remain at home, having obtained relief from the use of cigarettes of coca. Every morning

he uses a cigarette, and finds perfect relief. ~~He uses three per day, and also has used an application of two-per-cent. solution of muriate, but finds that the cigarettes relieve him quicker and the effects last longer."

To sum up, therefore, coca smoked seems to produce the same effect on the system as coca taken internally in the form of fluid extract, wine, or elixir, but not in such a marked degree. Coca itself is known to be stimulant, tonic, and restorative to the system in the treatment of various diseases marked by debility and exhaustion. Nervous debility and exhaustion in all its forms, whether caused by diseases or excesses, are said to be relieved by it. Fatigue disappears, to be followed by a feeling of indescribable calm and satisfaction, increased strength of brain and muscle, and desire for mental and muscular occupation.

Coca has been used with great success in the treatment of the opium habit. It is also an excellent substitute for tobacco. It has been successfully used in dyspepsia, flatulency, colic, gastralgia, enteralgia, hysteria, hypochondria, spinal irritation, idiopathic convulsions, nervous erethism, and in the debility following severe acute affections. As it is a valuable restorative agent, checking tissue-waste, it is a useful remedy in consumption and wasting diseases generally. It is also of value in the nervous forms of sick headache, viigraine. It is said to be an aphrodisiac.

Now, my object in publishing this article is to introduce coca-leaf cigars to the notice of the profession. I have furnished what information I have to prove the cigars are capable of producing the action of the drug. In my own mind I have no doubts on the subject, though

1 the effects are milder than those resulting from the employment of the fluid preparations of coca internally. I have also summed up the properties said to be possessed by coca as a therapeutic agent. I have produced evidence, in addition to that furnished by Dr. Lewis, that it is of value in the treatment of hay fever; and, as it is important that the true value of this form of using coca-leaf should be known, I have had some made, and I will send samples to members of the profession, free of charge, who may desire to test them, and will publish the results, favorable or otherwise, in the medical press. I have no proprietary interest in them, nor have I copyrighted this article concerning them. The idea of coca in this form, and all information concerning it, is free to the use of the profession.—{Phila. Medical Times, Sept. 19th,

'1885.)

Coca Cigars Cheroots and Cigarettes

COCA CIGARETTES.

There Cigarettes are made with are the finest green leaves, and will thus be found to produce, in a convenient and agreeable form, the full anicsthctic effects of the drug.

Ci'ea Cigarettes will, by the sedative action of the fumes upoa the pharynx, larynx, and air-passages, relieve coughing, irritation of Be throat, and difficulty of breathing.

For the relief of Asthma, Hay-fkver, Chronic Cnocn, Drsram, and Irhit-atiox Of The Throat, these Cigarettes will prove Terr invaluable.

Cuca Cigarettes are put up in boxes at 3s. each.

THOMAS CHEISTY & Co., 155, Fenchurch Street,

_________ LONDON, F..C. ,

COCA CHEROOTS AND CIGARETTES.

For the Relief of Asthma, Hay Fever, Chronic Cough, Etc.

The beneficial effects reported from the use of coca leaves in the form of cheroots and cigarettes for the relief of asthmatic difficulties, irritative cough, etc., have induced us to prepare and offer them to the profession. They are made of coca leaves mixed with an equal portion of mild tobacco. The flavor and aroma are described by those who have used them as very agreeable. They produce a sedative effect on the pharynx, larynx, and air passages, which results frequently in the relief of irritative cough and difficult breathing. Impending attacks of asthmatic dyspnoea are said to be frequently warded off by their use, and chronic sufferers have been able thus to secure comfort. The effect seems to be due to an anaesthetic action of the smoke upon the mucous membrane with which it comes in contact. The peripheral irritation, which results in the spasms either of dyspnoea or of cough, is thus removed, and with removal of the cause the effect disappears. Prices and literature furnished on application.

Coca Cigarettes for Asthma and Coughs.

Cigarettes made of tobacco mixed with an equal portion of crushed leaves of erythroxylon coca, give much relief in asthma, hay fever, and chronic cough. The flavor is quite agreeable and a very pleasant aroma pervades the room. We know a lady who affirms that one of these cigarettes has many times saved her from an impending attack of asthmatic dyspnoea. We have frequently suggested its use to old smokers who were troubled with "cough," with satisfactory results. We are in possession of numerous testimonies to its efficacy in cases of chronic bronchitis of old people, difficulty of breathing, and irritative cough, when independent of organic pulmonary trouble. Its sedative action on the larynx and pharynx is quite remarkable; and it certainly seems to allay spasm, and to produce, in a lesser degree, the same results obtainable by hydrochlorate of cocaine on these parts. It is now nine years since we first suggested this use of coca; and we have no reason to alter the recommendation of its trial.

Coca Cigarettes.

In these columns (March World, 1885, page 78) Dr. Lewis called attention to his experience with cigarettes made from equal parts of tobacco and coca leaves, to be used for the relief of asthma, hay fever and chronic cough. Messrs. Parke, Davis & Co., of Detroit, Mich., have now manufactured these and placed them on the market at the low price of ten cents per package of ten cigarettes. It is hoped that the lot of the hay fever sufferer will be materially improved by means of them.

—Coca-leaf cigarettes are rapidly coming into use. Coca when smoked, seems to produce the same effect on the system as coca taken internally, in the form of fluid extract, wine or elixir, but as would be expected, not in such a marked degree. Coca cigarettes are an excellent substitute for tobacco, but it is very doubtful whether they are less injurious than tobacco.

Coca Cigarettes.—Dr. Nachtigall confers on the excellent properties of coca, especially of the wine, inalleviating hunger, stimulating the system, etc., which properties manifest themselves especially when taken while on a long march or while enduring other hardships. Later on, he recommends an entirely new preparation of coca—the cigarettes. In his discourse he says that, first of all, the very agreeable and mild taste and odor of coca, which admirably adapts it to this preparation, deserve mention. After he himself and some of his acquaintances tried them, he gave them to asthmatics; then he used them for catarrhal affections of the respiratory organs, and also for megrim of the nervous form. He is of the opinion that the good practical results which he invariably obtained were due to the anaesthetic action of the coca smoke upon the nerves of the relative mucous membrane. No disagreeable after-effects were noticed, so that persons who are susceptible to the action of nicotin in ordinary tobacco can smoke them with impunity. The doctor is convinced that these cigarettes will soon supplant those made of belladonna, hyoscyamus, stramonium, etc., and strongly urges a trial of them.—Pharmaceutical Record, June 15, 1887.

The sustaining and stimulating properties of the Coca plant have long been recognized, and in the form of wine and fluid extract it is constantly prescribed by English physicians. Dr. Nachtigal, of Stuttgart, has prepared a Coca tobacco and Coca cigarettes, in which the tobacco is entirely deprived of nicotine. These two forms, when smoked, will be found to possess all the most valuable and agreeable properties of tobacco, plus the sustaining and enlivening effects of Coca. They will be found to be a preventative against nervous headache, catarrhal symptoms, and especially in asthma, and are highly recommended by medical authorities for these complaints. The Coca cigarettes and Coca tobacco are sold by the French Hygienic Society, 56 Conduit Street, Regent Street, W. 1888 Illustrated Naval and Military Magazine

1909

the leaves of the coca-plant make the best cigarettes for asthma (Nachtigal).