Later used as a local anesthetic for eye, ear and throat surgery, still has limited surgical use. Because of its euphoric and energizing effects, many people in the late 19th century took cocaine. In the 1880s, Sigmund Freud published a series of papers praising cocaine's potential to cure depression, alcoholism and morphine addiction. Soon followed, however, by reports of fatal cocaine poisonings, mental disturbances and addiction. In 1911, Canada legally restricted cocaine use.
Cocaine makes user feel euphoric, energetic, talkative and mentally alert.
Large amounts may lead to erratic, possibly violent behaviour, tremors, vertigo, twitches or paranoia as well as increased blood pressure, rapid or irregular heartbeat, feelings of panic or anxiety, chest pain, heart attack, stroke or seizures. Euphoria gradually displaced by restlessness, insomnia, paranoia, eventual hallucinations and delusions. Chronic cocaine snorting often causes stuffiness, runny nose, eczema around the nostrils. Derived from a fungus on rye and other grains, it is then chemically manufactured in illicit labs. White, odourless, crystalline power, soluble in water.