Apparently Cocaine Cutting Agent Phenacetin Gives You Bladder Cancer

Looks like our old friend levamisole is back in the news, but now he's got a friend. The livestock de-wormer and cocaine cutting agent has been periodically featured in the news over the past couple of years, semi-erroneously being linked to the rotting of peoples faces. While the face rot does occur sometimes, it's highly, highly, unlikely that it'll affect your cocaine everyman. Phew!

Phenacetin, another substance included in the fucking-you-over process or drug cutting, is giving its users an increased risk of bladder cancer. Corr, I only wanted to sober myself up in a pub toilet by doing a line of gear off a condom machine using a urinal trough to hoist myself high enough, now you're telling me I'm gonna get bloody bladder cancer? The thing is though, levamisole is used in chemotherapy, so perhaps while phenacetin is giving you cancer, the levamisole is also fighting the cancer too. I bet you the boffins up at Oxford didn't think of that did they?

65% of "street cocaine" is cut with phenacetin (I don't know what other kind of cocaine there is other than street cocaine, if it's out there drop me an email). The study comes from DrugAbuse.com, an American website probably more concerned with the sharp increase of fentanyl in heroin, which is apparently called "Serial Killer" and "Drop Dead" on the skreets. The drugs we consume now are around 30 per cent less pure than they were back in the golden days, and we're cutting them with the stuff that's killing our beloved musicians. Where is the love?

Of course, as we noted in our article about the aforementioned levamisole, all drugs come with a spooky scare story intended to make you think twice about ringing 'Albert GAK' at 3AM so you don't give yourself bladder cancer, but inevitably they fail to do so. Whether or not this de-worming agent for cows is in our bugle or not, we're still going to hoover it up like a malfunctioning Henry.

More from VICE:

The Truth About Britain's 'Flesh-Eating' Cocaine

Here's What's in All that Coke You Did This Weekend

Killer Coke Explained