CanTest, CAHMA, Spilt Milk pill test drive forced to turn away festival goer

Canberra’s pill testers say demand for drug testing was so high before Spilt Milk festival they had to turn away festival goers. Here’s what they found.

Canberra's pill testers were forced to turn away festival goers as demand for the service spilled over ahead of Spilt Milk festival. Picture: Supplied

Canberra’s pill testers say they needed to turn away people eager to get their drugs tested due to increased demand leading up to Spilt Milk festival.

The capital’s permanent pill testing site, CanTest, run by CAHMA and Directions Health Service, was open for extended hours on November 24 and 25 to accommodate a surge of festival goers. 

CAHMA executive director Chris Gough said during the three pill testing shifts leading up to the festival CanTest tested 106 drug samples.

He said this included 32 samples on November 18, 33 samples on November 24 and 41 samples on November 25.

Canberra’s pill testers worked overtime leading up to the Spilt Milk festival, with over 100 samples tested over the three CanTest shifts prior to the music festival. Picture: NCA NewsWire / Martin Ollman

“Twenty-seven people were turned away from the service as we simply could not test any more substances in the time available to us,” Mr Gough said.

He described the pill testing drive as an “incredible success” despite being forced to turn people away.

CAHMA executive director Chris Gough said the pill testing drive was a success despite being forced to turn some festival goers away. Picture: Supplied

“We had an enormous amount of uptake from festival goers truly proving that our youth, and people who use drugs, care about their health and wellbeing and want and need harm reduction advice and information about the drugs they use,” Mr Gough said.

The executive director previously said cathinones, a family of stimulant drugs, were detected in some pills which were sold as MDMA.

CanTest was founded earlier this year, and it was the first time Spilt Milk has been held in Canberra since the service was established.

“Last time there was no pill testing onsite and CanTest was not running so this is a major improvement,” Mr Gough said.

“Pill Testing Australia tried to run drug checking at the last Spilt Milk but ran into problems as the land (the festival was held on) was owned by the federal government,” he said.

The ACT has the most liberal drug laws in the country, becoming the first jurisdiction to decriminalise the possession of Cannabis in 2020 and being the first state or territory to pass a law to decriminalise possession of small amounts of illicit drugs earlier this year.

CAHMA will release a detailed update about what drugs were found next week as part of their monthly data release next week.