Cocaine used to just get you high. Now it rots your skin.
Doctors say the cocaine hitting the streets in New York and Los Angeles is now cut with a drug that veterinarians use to de-worm livestock, causing cokeheads' skin to rot off.
In a June report published in the Journal of the American Academy of Dermatology, doctors described six cases where users developed ghastly splotches of dead skin after snorting or smoking cocaine laced with the drug levamisole.
Dr. Mary Gail Mercurio, a dermatologist at the University of Rochester Medical Center who co-authored the study, said her hospital had treated five cases in the last year.
"We've seen very profound areas of necrosis -- dying skin -- usually located on scalp, ears, face and elsewhere on the body," Mercurio said. "It's very alarming."
Nearly a dozen more patients have been admitted to Harbor-UCLA Medical Center, KTLA television reported.
"We believe these cases of skin reactions and illnesses linked to contaminated cocaine are just the tip of the iceberg in a looming public health problem posed by levamisole," the study's authors wrote.
Levamisole is used to treat farm animals for worms and was once used to fight colon cancer.
Drug officials said its use as a cutting agent has skyrocketed in recent years.
In 2010, the Drug Enforcement Agency said nearly 70% of the coke coming into the U.S. was cut with levamisole, up from 30% in 2008, Time Magazine reported.
Health departments in Canada, New Mexico, Delaware and Washington have also issued warnings about the dangers of tainted blow.
Mercurio said she suspected producers were using levamisole because it can cause a small high that adds to coke's kick.
The drug devastates blood vessels under the skin, causing patches to turn black and rot off, she said.
"In one of the more interesting ones, the patient used cocaine again and developed the same skin reaction again," Dr. Noah Craft, another co-author, told KTLA television. "He then switched drug dealers, and the problem cleared up."
Mercurio said that the necrosis is typically treated with potent steroids or blood thinners, but cokeheads who kick the habit can avoid costly treatments.
"If we can get them away from the cocaine, some improved without any intervention," she said.
