Why pill-testing at music festivals in Victoria could save more lives
People keep dying after ingesting poorly made drugs, like MDMA and ecstasy, and pill-testing is one way we can stop this. So why isn’t the government getting behind it, asks Mikey Cahill.
Opinion
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Good morning, curious reader. Let’s see how woke you are.
I’ve called you into my office so we can have a heart-to-heart about a hot-button topic: pill-testing of illegal drugs at music festivals.
You’re already getting a little steamy under the collar, so let me gently convince you over the next three minutes while you have your sweet way with brunch.
Here goes.
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Fact: Australians will keep buying drugs from dealers, on the internet or in person.
Whether you support or oppose pill-testing will not increase or decrease the number of people risking their lives by taking contraband.
A spate of deadly orange pills swept Australia this festival season, resulting in patrons falling ill and even dying. Paramedics and hospitals were left to clean up the mess.
Why?
Because Aussies love drugs.
Research released last year by the Australian Institute of Criminology showed Australia has the second highest per-head concentration of drug dealers on the “dark net”, just after the Netherlands. People are thinking global, buying local.
Let me remind you: it’s up to police to catch the criminals.
It’s up to lawmakers to minimise the harm done to the people consuming the drugs.
We have a major problem at the moment. People are dying after ingesting poorly made drugs, such as MDMA and ecstasy. Dealers cut drugs with all sorts of nasty substances such as bath salts, corn starch, soap and detergents. Gross.
Clearly, what’s being done at present to stop people becoming ill or dying after dabbling in drugs is not working. In the words of The Saints’ 1978 song, Know Your Product.
Still sceptical? Let me remind you of the definition of insanity popularly attributed to Albert Einstein: “Doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results.”
An open letter from the Australian Festivals Association, released on Wednesday, reads: “We need to be able to legally implement preventive strategies, not just reactive ones, and include any harm-minimisation tools that are available.
“We believe, and have evidence to support, that a combination of robust harm-minimisation strategies will help Australians make safer choices and reduce the harmful impacts of drug use on festival-goers and the broader community. This necessarily involves a collaborative, multi-layered approach of drug education, peer-to-peer support, pill-testing, health services, and policing.”
If only we’d tried pill-testing before, and it had worked.
Well, we have.
Wait. What? We have?
You bet.
Groovin’ The Moo Festival in Canberra last March did just that.
The STA-SAFE Consortium conducted pill-testing for patrons, and 130 people used the service: 85 drug samples were tested, and — shock, horror — nobody died.
People found out whether their drugs were pure or not, and made informed decisions.
The ACT Government came around to the idea after consulting a working group of police, health officials, and drug and alcohol specialists.
“The conservative side of politics in Canberra continue to take a ‘head in the sand’ approach to pill-testing,” ACT Health Minister Meegan Fitzharris said recently.
In 2017, the president of the Australian Drug Law Reform Foundation, Alex Wodak, told website Mamamia: “It’s wrong to talk about a ‘bad batch’ of drugs. It’s more accurate to talk about a ‘bad batch’ of police ministers who are standing by a policy that is not working.”
If we make progressive changes, we can save lives.
It’s devastatingly simple.
New Zealand has, once again, shown us how it’s done.
This week, Kiwi Police Minister Stuart Nash said the idea of independent pill-testing tents was “a fantastic idea and should be installed at all our festivals”.
He echoed the thrust of that insanity definition: “The war on drugs hasn’t worked in the past 20 years so it’s time to change to a more compassionate and restorative approach.”
New Zealand was first nation to give the woman the vote, has free dental care for children, 80 per cent renewable power, a treaty with its indigenous people recognising Maori land rights, and (rrrright up there) the dynamic comedy duo Flight of the Conchords, “the fourth most popular folk parodist act in New Zealand.”
We’re perched at a similar moment to where we were as a nation with the gay marriage debate two years ago.
It took a snail-mail postal vote for us to come to our senses and say Yes to love.
Premier Daniel Andrews, I know you’re reading. Thanks for being a politician with purpose.
I’m asking you to take the bit between your teeth and implement harm-minimisation at events where people are taking drugs to have a good time.
Or you could keep just doing the same thing about the problem, and get nowhere.
Just one thing, though.
That sounds like madness.
Mikey Cahill is a Herald Sun columnist
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