Snips
Drug Enforcement Administration documents reviewed by The Associated Press indicate that 30 percent of all U.S. cocaine seizures are tainted with the drug. And health officials told the AP that most physicians know virtually nothing about its risks.
"I would think it would be fair to say the vast majority of doctors in the United States have no idea this is going on," said Eric Lavonas, assistant director of the Rocky Mountain Poison and Drug Center in Denver, where as much as half of the cocaine is believed to contain levamisole. "You can't diagnose a disease you've never heard of."
The medication called levamisole has killed at least three people in the U.S. and Canada and sickened more than 100 others. It can be used in humans to treat colorectal cancer, but it severely weakens the body's immune system, leaving patients vulnerable to fatal infections.
Levamisole started showing up frequently in cocaine from Colombia in January 2008. By late last year, the DEA concluded that the spiked cocaine was in wide circulation.
At the same time, hospitals around the country began noticing more cocaine users coming in with agranulocytosis, an illness that suppresses white blood cells necessary to fight off infections.
In Spokane, Wash., a woman in her mid-40s who tested positive for cocaine turned up at a hospital suffering from rashes and other maladies. She eventually died, and the doctor who investigated suspected she had used cocaine laced with levamisole. Doctors suspect levamisole in at least three other illnesses in the Spokane area.
"It's hard to know where this contamination (is), in what part of the country it's located, because there's really no systematic testing for it," said Dr. Joel McCullough, health officer for the Spokane area.
"I don't think it's on the radar of a lot of people, so if there are some other symptoms, I don't know if many clinicians would think to consider that."
Doctors and hospitals remain largely unaware of the cocaine additive. A spokesman for the New Mexico health department said his office plans to write a piece for a Centers for Disease Control and Prevention newsletter in September.
LeGatt said doctors should consider levamisole exposure in cases where otherwise healthy adults or newborn babies come down with infections because of low white blood cell counts. But the levamisole only appears in urine for a few days after exposure, meaning tests should be done as soon as possible.
http://www3.signonsandiego.com/stor...ug-war-tainted-cocaine-083109/?&zIndex=158219
Drug Enforcement Administration documents reviewed by The Associated Press indicate that 30 percent of all U.S. cocaine seizures are tainted with the drug. And health officials told the AP that most physicians know virtually nothing about its risks.
"I would think it would be fair to say the vast majority of doctors in the United States have no idea this is going on," said Eric Lavonas, assistant director of the Rocky Mountain Poison and Drug Center in Denver, where as much as half of the cocaine is believed to contain levamisole. "You can't diagnose a disease you've never heard of."
The medication called levamisole has killed at least three people in the U.S. and Canada and sickened more than 100 others. It can be used in humans to treat colorectal cancer, but it severely weakens the body's immune system, leaving patients vulnerable to fatal infections.
Levamisole started showing up frequently in cocaine from Colombia in January 2008. By late last year, the DEA concluded that the spiked cocaine was in wide circulation.
At the same time, hospitals around the country began noticing more cocaine users coming in with agranulocytosis, an illness that suppresses white blood cells necessary to fight off infections.
In Spokane, Wash., a woman in her mid-40s who tested positive for cocaine turned up at a hospital suffering from rashes and other maladies. She eventually died, and the doctor who investigated suspected she had used cocaine laced with levamisole. Doctors suspect levamisole in at least three other illnesses in the Spokane area.
"It's hard to know where this contamination (is), in what part of the country it's located, because there's really no systematic testing for it," said Dr. Joel McCullough, health officer for the Spokane area.
"I don't think it's on the radar of a lot of people, so if there are some other symptoms, I don't know if many clinicians would think to consider that."
Doctors and hospitals remain largely unaware of the cocaine additive. A spokesman for the New Mexico health department said his office plans to write a piece for a Centers for Disease Control and Prevention newsletter in September.
LeGatt said doctors should consider levamisole exposure in cases where otherwise healthy adults or newborn babies come down with infections because of low white blood cell counts. But the levamisole only appears in urine for a few days after exposure, meaning tests should be done as soon as possible.
http://www3.signonsandiego.com/stor...ug-war-tainted-cocaine-083109/?&zIndex=158219