“There is no evidence to show that pill testing encourages drug use, and people who have a substance tested often elect to throw it away when they find out what it really is,” he said. “Drug use has been part of human culture for thousands of years. Pill testing won’t change that, but it will make drug use much more…

‘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,’ Mr Nash told Stuff. ‘If someone is dealing they will be taken through the justice system. But if it was someone who has one or two pills, you don’t want them to get a criminal record for a bad…

The Age believes, cautiously, that a trial of pill testing at public events involving chiefly young people has merit. We have argued that the debate should be led by evidence rather than simple ideology. On this basis, a well-regulated trial makes sense. […]

Kids who take drugs are not bad kids. Telling them to abstain is not going to stop them experimenting, but telling them what they are actually taking may keep them safer while doing it. […]

“Every time there is an event now, people are asking: why aren’t you providing a pill testing facility? Why are people needlessly dying?” said Gino Vumbaca, who works for one of the organizations involved in last year’s test run, the International Harm Reduction Association […]

The doctor-turned federal MP who once argued the controversial case for Australia’s first heroin injecting room has intervened in the debate over pill-testing, warning political resistance to government-sanctioned drug taking at music festivals was costing young lives. […]

Member for Moggill Christian Rowan, an addiction medicine specialist, said he did not condone drug use but substance misuse was occurring, and pill testing should be considered. […]

Is it time to call a truce in the war on drugs? Dr James Freeman looks at the evidence; and the evidence shows prohibition has failed, and decriminalising drugs ought to save lives and deliver both social and economic benefit. […]

Calls for pill testing to be allowed at events where the consumption of illicit and potentially dangerous substances is likely has ignited a fierce and bitter debate. Adriana Buccianti, whose son Daniel died in early 2012, has copped many of those remarks — total strangers gleefully telling her that her gentle, hard-working chef deserved what he got. […]

As Australian politicians continue to rule out pill testing at music festivals, New Zealand appears to be embracing the controversial practice. The country’s Police Minister Stuart Nash said on Tuesday the idea of independent pill testing tents was “a fantastic idea and should be installed at all our festivals”. “The war on drugs hasn’t worked in the past 20 years,…