Risk
According to a study of 1081 US residents aged over 11 years who had used cocaine for the first time within 24 months prior to assessment, the risk of becoming cocaine-dependent within 2 years of first use (recent-onset) is 5-6%; after 10 years, it increases to 15-16%. These are the aggregate rates for all types of use considered, i.e., smoking, snorting, injecting. Among recent-onset users, the relative rates are higher for smoking (3.4 times) and much higher for injecting. They also vary, based on other characteristics, such as sex: among recent-onset users, women are 3.3 times more likely to become addicted, compared with men; age: among recent-onset users, those who started using at ages 12 or 13 were 4 times as likely to become addicted, compared with those who started between ages 18 and 20.
However, a study of non-deviant users in Amsterdam found "relative absence of destructive and compulsive use patterns over a ten year period" and concluded that cocaine users can and do exercise control. "Our respondents applied two basic types of controls to themselves: 1) restricting use to certain situations and to emotional states in which cocaine's effects would be most positive, and 2) limiting mode of ingestion to snorting of modest amounts of cocaine, staying below 2.5 grams a week for some, and below 0.5 grams a week for most. Nevertheless, those whose use level exceeded 2.5 grams a week all returned to lower levels."
Read more about this topic: Cocaine Dependence
Famous quotes containing the word risk:
“Anyone who takes himself too seriously always runs the risk of looking ridiculous; anyone who can consistently laugh at himself does not.”
—Václav Havel (b. 1936)
“The appetite for power, even for universal power, is only insane when there is no possibility of indulging it; a man who sees the possibility opening before him and does not try to grasp it, even at the risk of destroying himself and his country, is either a saint or a mediocrity.”
—Simone Weil (1909–1943)
“Nature, we are starting to realize, is every bit as important as nurture. Genetic influences, brain chemistry, and neurological development contribute strongly to who we are as children and what we become as adults. For example, tendencies to excessive worrying or timidity, leadership qualities, risk taking, obedience to authority, all appear to have a constitutional aspect.”
—Stanley Turecki (20th century)