Did you know? The truth behind the coca leaf

Blog image posted by Corey

By: Eliza

When most people hear the word coca, they think of the drug. However, this is far from the whole story. Yes, a chemical from the leaves of the coca plant is the essential ingredient in cocaine, but it’s not the only one. Coca leaves, water, gasoline, kerosene, sulfuric acid and various chemicals are included in the mixture that gives way to the final product cocaine. 

It is necessary to separate coca from this connection to cocaine in order to realize its significant role in Andean culture. The coca plant is a bush native to the Andes Mountains of South America. First harvested by the Incas, this plant has been used for medicinal purposes by the inhabitants of this mountainous region for thousands of years.  

Millions of inhabitants in this region are faced with poverty and drink coca tea or chew the leaves in order to alleviate hunger, fatigue, and altitude sickness. The coca leaf is a source of energy, enabling families and laborers to get through a day of arduous work, particularly miners and agricultural workers in Peru and Bolivia.

In addition, the coca leaf is the livelihood for the many coca farmers in the Andean region and the means of supporting their families. For the Quechan and Aymara indigenous people, the coca leaf is more than a means of survival. It is a vital part of religious rituals and ceremonies, such as offerings to divinities and their connection to Pachamama, Mother Earth.

To the ancient and current inhabitants of the Andes, this leaf remains sacred. Yet it has been perceived unjustly in the eyes of many. It is time to look beyond labels and open our eyes to the importance of this leaf, the spirit and identity of this culture. In the words of Evo Morales, president of Bolivia, “The green coca leaf is not the white of cocaine. This coca leaf represents Andean culture. It is a coca leaf that represents the environment and the hopes of our people.”

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the coca leaf

My comments are about the coca leaf.What u write is 100 percent accurate,however why aren't the people of south america doing more to get the truth out there???This is also a issue close my personel life.Thru simple research i have learned there are sooo many lies out there about this simple leaf from nature,yet i do not see representive of south america dispelling those lies,why??The biggest lie I see out there is that coca is cocaine,thats a outright lie.The other is that there is cocaine in the leaf,another lie,there is coca in the leaf,cocaine has got to be synthetically made from coca.This lie is permeated thru out america by all the laboratories out there who use the chemical equation for benzoecgonine and telling everyone that chemical formula is cocaines chemical formula when it is not.The chemical formal for so-called benzoecgonine is,,,C16H19NO4 and the true chemical formula for white powder cocaine is C17H21CINO4,,,so why do labs tell everyone that the first one is cocaine and not what it truly is,benzoecgonine???When u ask anyone at these labs all over america,only b.t.w. why they do that,they say because that is America's pharmocopia formula for cocaine,even though its not true white powder cocaine,that everyone in the untied States thinks there being tested for,when there NOT!!!Anyone w/1/2 a brain can see,this leaf is green,not white,why doesn't Canada,or Australia or a dozen other countries use that American Formula???Could it be they still have some morality to there countries?Could it be they do not take lightly there relationships w/all countries,so they do not lie about a agriculture crop of the South American farmers that will keep there families above poverty,and I am talking natural coca products,not cocaine.Why are our chemist so eager to jump on the coca is cocaine band wagon when its not true. Why do all Americam laboratories use the same reagents or extraction methologies with the same base chemicals that are used to actual make cocaine???Are the making it as they test for it,thus proving a positive for cocaine every time??? I understand America's logic in this lie,if they allowed coca products into our country they think All americans will make cocaine from them,to me thats just insulting!!!!To not give the majority of american people the credit to know true cocaine hydrochloride,white powder true cocaine,,is a terrible drug,,,that the majority of americans have absolutly no need or desire to do,is a true insult.But even though several other countries actual trust there populus and have found absolutely no proof that there residents do such a thing,,,The u.s. is more interested now a days in controlling there people,not allowing free will anywhere anymore.Sure there would be idiots who might try it,but there again,just like liquer or wine, there are ways to curtail such a thing from happening.To screw a entire civilization,a country of human beings over a lie like this one is unethical,and immoral,no wonder why the name America strikes anger in soooo many other countries now a days.It never use too.But getting back to my point,again,why isnt south america doing more to get the truth out there,coca is not cocaine.Cocaine has got to be made by using coca illegally thru a chemical process,the coca left alone with no solvent added to extract the coca,therefore in its natural traditional form,is only coca,not cocaine!!!!!!!paita