• Pill testing won’t ‘green light’ drug use

    Edith Cowan University psychologist Stephen Bright told the inquiry pill testing offered a way to counsel young people about illicit drug use. “The evidence we have is pill testing doesn’t give the green light or normalise drug use,” he said. “With one in 10 people having already used ecstasy, drug use is already normalised.” […]

  • ‘Stuck in war on drugs’, says NSW Health music festivals consultant

    A medical expert who helped draft the NSW government’s music festival guidelines has told an inquest Australia is “stuck in a war on drugs” and sniffer dogs at events are “unhelpful”, leading patrons to undergo riskier behaviours. St Vincent’s Hospital toxicology, pharmacology and addiction medicine specialist Jonathan Brett also said the nation was lagging behind other countries that have instituted…

  • Festival deaths inquest: police pushed to release protocols after ‘unconscionable’ strip searches

    David Caldicott, the emergency doctor and pill-testing advocate, described the practice as “unconscionable”. “It has no health benefit, as far as I’m concerned, and it’s got considerable mental health issues associated with it,” he said last week. “Colleagues of mine in the UK find it extraordinary that it is happening in a first-world country.” […]

  • The profile of festival drug takers might be different to what you expec

    We should expand trials of on-site drug checking services at festivals and outside these settings (for example, drop-in services at urban centres). Drug checking (or pill testing) services invite members of the public to anonymously submit drug samples for forensic analysis and then provide individualised feedback of results and counselling as appropriate. […]

  • Pill Testing Saves Lives, Heavy Policing Takes Them

    It’s an old harm reduction adage that new strategies to combat drug war casualties always face harsh resistance. This seems to be especially so in NSW, which was once a pioneer in establishing needle exchanges and a safe injecting room, both of which Dr Wodak brought across the line. “If this premier doesn’t support pill testing, then the next one…

  • Make Aust leaders in harm reduction: mum

    Outside the court, mother Jennie Ross-King said she had a determination to pursue “every possible option for change” and urged NSW Premier Gladys Berejiklian do the same.” Our state government needs to show the same courage as this group of parents have who have lost a daughter or a son, it needs to stop here,” she told reporters outside NSW…

  • NSW music festival deaths: Teen wanted help hours before MDMA-related cardiac arrest

    “The use of police drug-detection dogs at festival settings is probably the strategy to be least used if your central goal is reducing harm and improving public health and safety. “Police use of drug detection dogs was associated with increased purchasing (of drugs) within festival grounds.” […]

  • Mother of festival drug death victim says Gladys Berejiklian needs to show courage

    On Wednesday, outside a NSW coronial hearing into six MDMA-related deaths at music festivals, Jennie Ross-King called on the state government to “show the same courage as these group of parents has, who have lost a daughter or a son”. “It needs to stop here,” she said. “I say this to the premier; premier, thank you for your sympathies. […]

  • Toxic cocktail of booze, drugs key cause for medical care at festivals

    “On-site forensic drug testing services and brief interventions that engage festivalgoers to reconsider their drinking practices are also warranted. “In a society where drug-taking will occur, regardless of what policy or policing measures are in place, aspiring to zero harm for those who use drugs as opposed to zero tolerance to using drugs is a far better solution.” […]

  • Drug addiction doctor to inquest: Pill testing will work

    A drug addiction specialist has told of her “deep concern” over the deaths of six young people who died of MDMA overdoses at NSW music festivals and called for pill testing to eradicate dangerous drugs peddled on the black market. […]