more and more French people have already used cocaine

The French Observatory of Drugs and Addictive Tendencies published a study on Wednesday which highlights the increase in cocaine consumption in France.

According to a study by the French Observatory on Drugs and Addictive Tendencies (OFDT), one in ten French adults have already taken cocaine, and consumption has increased tenfold in 30 years. The other novelty highlighted by this study is that there is no standard profile, consumers are of all ages and all backgrounds. The motivations are also more varied.

Marie, 33, is one of these regular consumers: “It happens to me in festive contexts, a bit like the way we drink alcohol, but stronger. It gives energy, it stimulates, it gives rise to more in-depth conversations because we is more gray, it’s nice.” She started at 18, at university, and today it’s quite easy for her to get it whenever she wants: “I have phone numbers, it’s a delivery system, I contact the person, I tell them what I need, and they usually come within an hour.” One hour to have a gram of cocaine delivered, for a price of between 60 and 70 euros.

Sometimes there is a fine line between recreational and professional use. Rémi, now 32, fell into it when he worked in a restaurant in Paris a few years ago: “At 8 p.m., in the middle of service, we went to the kitchen and off we went. There was no notion of a party, it had become mechanical, like smoking a cigarette.” And this vicious circle has not made it more efficient, contrary to popular belief: “It didn’t help me in any way, I didn’t need that to be better. And the comebacks are often very hard, I see myself on Sunday crying all the tears in my body, saying to myself ‘I’m a b***’, it’s violent.”

Today, Rémi has dropped out, even though he still works in the restaurant business. Staggered schedules, high speeds, in certain professions, we consume more cocaine, according to Marie Jauffret-Roustide, sociologist and researcher at Inserm: “There is the restaurant industry, the fishermen’s circles, and then among truck drivers, the professions required to work at night, the health professions are required to consume more stimulants. But these are very general trends, “It’s a product that can today concern all social classes.”

The French Office for Drugs and Addictive Tendencies points out that cocaine causes psychological dependence and exposes people to paranoia, risky behavior and even cardiovascular complications.