RIO DE JANEIRO, July 23 – Atlantic Sharpnose sharks swimming in the waters off Rio de Janeiro tested positive for cocaine, as well as benzoylecgonine, the major metabolite of cocaine.
The consumption of cocaine in Brazil, particularly in the megalopolis of Rio de Janeiro, mirrors that of the world – it’s sky high!
In 2023, the UN Global Report revealed that cocaine production, purity and trade jumped to an all-time yearly high, 2,300 metric tons.
Brazil is the biggest consumer of shark meat, a booming $2bn annual legal/illegal trade. Brazilians could be eating cocaine, mouthful by mouthful – godawful chemical compounds.
Cocaine production requires soaking coca leaves in gasoline and other chemicals such as ether, sulfuric acid and ammonia for the extraction of cocaine hydrochloride. The gasoline and solvents are then drained and the cocaine base solidifies into a paste. It’s then cooked until the liquid and other dreadful chemicals have evaporated, producing “bricks” containing cocaine hydrochloride.
Those bricks are packed and further sold and processed with additional toxic chemicals like hydrochloric acid, ammonia and potassium salts to create powder cocaine.
The unlawful and dangerous distillation of coca leaves requires megatons of smuggled caustic compounds. They are flushed or bled into the surrounding waterways or airways inflicting dead zones within nature, hastening the Sixth Mass Extinction. By the by, that shark meat trade is driving extinction in the ocean and it’s run by transnational organised crime.
Growing, processing, distribution and cocaine profits are also controlled by criminal syndicates. They launder ~$200bn per annum through the welcoming-arms of international bankers.
Each year, cocaine destroys millions of lives. It ruins families and communities. Cocaine robs, rots and zombifies millions of human brains.
My Brazilian colleagues found that 12 of 13, or 92% of the Atlantic sharpnose sharks in their study were poisoned with cocaine. It’s pouring into the ocean from treated and untreated human sewage. Sharks are swimming in cocaine tainted water.
How do people struggling on Main Street afford cocaine? Line by line. Ten bucks here, twenty bucks there. What exactly are the users sniffing? Is the “coke” potent and pure? Not a chance. It’s cut with just about anything that resembles the colour white, like toilet bowl cleaner “Comet”, or pipe unclogger “Drano”, or, who knows with what?
Polluting with impunity the ocean via wastewater treatment facilities brimming with cocaine, crystal meth, fentanyl and every other conceivable illicit narcotic, pharmaceutical, herbicide and insecticide are a pathetic indictment on the sanity of the human race, and more specifically those who are purportedly leading the world. It is also a flagrant disregard for life itself, and all the other magnificent planetary creatures and lifeforms.
Is it any wonder why the moneymen, asset/pension fund managers, oligarchs, tycoons, barons, billionaires, kingpins, despots, world leaders and other plunderers are laughing themselves, scot-free, all the way to their planet-destroying banks? I think not.
Agitate. Disrupt. Defend.
Reese Halter is a bees/trees/seas defender.
Unearthly Wails is a special edition, a collection of poetry
illustrated by renowned Ojibwa artist Terry McCue.
Email: HalterBooks@gmail.com to order
