A University of Wollongong legal expert says the NSW government’s zero-tolerance approach to illicit drugs like MDMA at music festivals was doing more harm than good. Ben Mostyn, a lecturer in the school of law, advocated a harm minimisation approach – adding his voice to the growing number of individuals and organisations calling for pill testing. […]

We have the opportunity to ensure reforms are implemented within a social justice model in collaboration with affected communities. At the same time, we can tackle those social and economic problems that drive people into the trade in the first place. Legally regulating drugs isn’t radical, it’s responsible. Drugs are too dangerous not to be regulated, and too profitable not to…

“All the evidence shows that ‘zero tolerance’ and ‘just say no’ policies simply don’t work and that harm reduction and treatment is the best way to minimise the dangers and reduce the broader impacts on crime and health. It’s 2019. It’s time for change. The majority of Australians support decriminalisation and 82% of young Australians support pill testing.” […]

Port Phillip council, which includes the popular St Kilda entertainment district, is calling on the Victorian Labor government to allow and help fund drug testing at participating venues. “Two years ago the Port Phillip council said that we supported the use of a trial. Since then there’s been a bitter harvest of dead bodies around the country,” Mayor Dick Gross…

When the millions of Australians … who have used cannabis, ecstasy or cocaine over the past twelve months hear the Premier’s message that “there is no such thing as a safe illegal drug” and “just say no” they wonder what planet she is living on. Young people are not fools. They want us, as politicians, to “get real” about illegal…

The Royal Australasian College of Physicians, which represents more than 17,000 physicians and paediatricians, has sent an open letter to NSW premier Gladys Berejiklian and her counterparts urging them to follow the lead of the ACT. […]

I hope Australia embraces pill-testing, just as it embraced the supervised injecting room. But we must act fast. How many Australians will die before we remember this significant part of our identity — that we are a gloriously practical people? […]

“The failed war on drugs has killed our friends, family and others in our community for decades while politicians and police have wilfully ignored the mounting evidence that zero-tolerance drug policing does not work,” organisers said in a statement. […]

Australia’s peak body for physicians have called on Premier Gladys Berejiklian to introduce pill testing trials at NSW festivals, telling her there is sufficient evidence to support the intervention. The Royal Australasian College of Physicians have written to Ms Berejiklian – and her state and territory counterparts – imploring her to reconsider her hardline stance against pill testing. […]

The NSW coroner will hold an inquest into the recent deaths of five people of suspected drug overdoses at music festivals across the state, with a public hearing to kick off next week. The announcement follows the death of a 19-year-old Central Coast woman on Saturday after she attended FOMO festival at Parramatta Park. […]