Festival season is well under way, and drug-related deaths seem to be increasingly making the headlines, with two young tragedies in May at Mutiny festival in Portsmouth.
This frequent media coverage has brought into focus the controversial debate about whether drugs-testing facilities should be allowed at festivals and/or nightclubs in the U.K, and even the legalisation of such substances.
In May 2017, Sussex Police warned Eastbourne users about an extra-strong batch of cocaine found to be nearly 100% pure, up to double the strength of standard street produce. With another two deaths suspected from this batch on the sunshine coast, Detective Inspector Neil Ralph commented,
“Often the only person who knows the source of the drug is deceased… Taking drugs in any form is dangerous, particularly when the user does not know the purity of the drug”.
Ralph’s comment highlights the need for readily available testing facilities, and a strong review on current policy. The poignant fact of the matter is, the current law does not work; we are not going to stop people taking drugs, and the government should recognise this. It has become a societal norm, and whether this is in line with our moral compass or not, it is something that needs to be urgently addressed. So, why don’t we focus our energy on harm reduction? Telling people that they cannot do something and making it overtly taboo will not stop people from doing it. In fact, it is likely to incite the opposite, and inevitably lead to more fatalities.
Voluntary organisations such as The Loop U.K (https://wearetheloop.org/) currently do incredible work at festivals, bars, and clubs. Their hashtag #timetotest stands for their ethos of providing harm reduction advice and information, welfare support, drug safety testing and training. They are non-profit and not government funded. Most recently, their online presence on social media has been used as a platform to warn users of ‘bad batches’, such as the ‘Blue Punisher’ pill, believed to be the primary cause of death of a further two festival-goers last month at Parklife in Manchester. The below campaign was posted on twitter, and their website.
Particularly strong doses of MDMA have been found in ecstasy pills in recent years, with some containing up to 340mg (a ‘normal’ adult dose should be between 100-200mg). Education is therefore imperative.
Just think how ground-breaking this idea could be in developing testing and knowledge sharing throughout the UK if it had parliament backing. With the correct funding and media coverage, these messages could reach future festival-goers before it becomes too late. It seems we are well behind our European neighbours, with many super clubs in Berlin, Amsterdam and Prague already implementing pill-checker machines in multiple underground clubs.
Is it time for the UK to catch up?
The pioneering work that The Loop have been doing over the past few years hasn’t gone unrecognised, with a government petition now set up here: https://www.change.org/p/uk-parliament-allow-drug-testing-at-festivals-to-save-lives?recruiter=873922297&utm_source=share_petition&utm_medium=copylink&utm_campaign=psf_combo_share_abi.pacific_abi_share_button_ordering_1.abi_featured_fb.CHkqzXg0QhmNjGyQrLrlKA.3
This petition focuses on drug testing; a gateway to the debate on legalisation of such class A’s, which for many, is a sore subject, particularly those who have lost loved ones from drug abuse. But surely if the government legalised these drugs, they would be able to ensure regulation, similar to how alcohol is currently policed, and therefore in turn reduce drug-related deaths.
One of the most prolific, and most dangerous, pieces of media misinformation is the claim that MDMA-related deaths are the solid result of overdoses. Although not entirely safe, many deaths caused by ‘ecstasy’ are not down to the substance MDMA itself. Note the inverted comma’s, because a lot of deaths falling under this category will be from pills containing other harmful substances (such as n-ethylpentylone) sold falsely, as MDMA.
When it comes to deaths from MDMA with no ‘harmful cuts’, this can be down to three main factors; heatstroke/dehydration, pre-existing and unknown health conditions, and Hyponaetremia (water-toxicity). The most common is heatstroke, where the MDMA is only one factor of many. MDMA does raise the body temperature about one degree and constrains the body’s natural thermoregulation. Pair this with dancing in a hot environment and not drinking enough water, and you have a lethal recipe. This aids the need for easy access to water at festivals and nightclubs, without paying over the odds. Some festivals will only have bottled water, at a charge of £3. Think that is extortionate? Super clubs such as Amnesia on party island Ibiza have been known to charge €13 for a mini bottle of water (100ml), putting ecstasy users at risk of dehydration, and overheating.
With regards to pre-existing health conditions, it can be quite dangerous for someone with high blood pressure or heart disease to take these substances, as they do raise your heart rate and blood pressure. Even when coroners cite “cardiac enlargement” as a “significant condition” contributing to a death, the media insist on reporting an ‘overdose’, which is simply untrue.
Although dehydration and heatstroke in dance environments is the most common cause of MDMA-related medical emergencies, MDMA actually causes water retention, so in effect, you could drown yourself internally. Females are actually at a greater risk for this factor as oestrogen plays a momentous role in the transfer of water across cell membranes, aggravating the effects of water-toxicity. So, drink water, but not too much!
We seem to forget that alcohol is the deadliest, although most readily-available drug, yet because of its ‘legal’ status, people are not opposed to the idea of it being on the shelves. Let’s look at the facts. There were 3,744 drug poisoning deaths involving both legal and illegal drugs in England and Wales registered in 2016; In 2016 there were 7,327 alcohol-specific deaths in the UK; almost double! So why is the most harmful substance legal, and one of the least harmful, illegal?
It seems contradictory that nobody bats an eyelid when you see a group of rowdy, drunken men in the pub, whereby they are using one of the deadliest substances in Europe, yet anyone using recreational drugs such as ecstasy, cocaine, or ketamine, would be strongly frowned upon. Alcohol is proven to take more lives in the U.K, yet we freely buy it in most shops. The ‘illegal’ aspect of class A drugs is what makes the headlines. When someone dies from an overdose of ecstasy, or a ‘bad batch’, this is an unusual instance, hence an example is made of the situation and it makes the headlines. Imagine if we reported on every alcohol-related death… there would be no room for any other news!
Alcohol and tobacco by far the largest threat to human health globally, while illegal drug harms “don’t even come close”, according to a major report on addictive substances. The Global Statistics on Alcohol, Tobacco, and Illicit Drug Use: 2017 Status Report found a quarter of a billion hours of healthy human life are lost each year because of smoking and drinking, ten times more than is lost to illicit drug use.
People are clearly hungry for further information on substances and want to be more informed about what they are putting in their bodies. This is exemplified with the proven success of a pill testing trial in Canberra, with 129 people attending the health tent at a local festival, resulting in 83 samples being tested. Of the pills tested, 81% of people who thought they were consuming MDMA only, only 45% had MDMA as the major component. This leaves over half of pills tested to contain unknown substances, falsely advertised and sold as Ecstasy. This further brings home the importance of knowing what you are consuming, as unfortunately many drug suppliers are concerned with making money fast, regardless of the dangers, and misleading sales, to their buyers.
The stigma of talking about drug use due to its illegal status, is a prehistoric approach. Imagine how many lives could be saved through the regulation, taxation, and knowledge gained through de-criminalising controlled substance use. Take the recent actions of Canada legalising cannabis as an example; this progressive move in legislation is a step in the right direction, and the UK should follow suit.
The Victorian Parliamentary Committee visited The Loop’s drug safety testing at Secret Garden HQ in 2017, and MP Fiona Patten states they were “very impressed” with the recommendations. So, is there hope? Fiona Measham, Director of the Loop commented,
“We have strong police support – we couldn’t and wouldn’t operate without that – and we are calling on the government, Public Health England, local authorities and events across the country to support us in rolling out drug testing facilities further.”
It’s time to test.
