A compelling case for pushing pill testing

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A compelling case for pushing pill testing

Summer is the high point of the music festival calendar. Hundreds of thousands of revellers spend hundreds of millions of dollars, supporting an industry of ten of thousands of workers and countless artists.

It is a fact that many attendees will take illicit substances, a reality best responded to, international evidence proves, with harm-reduction policies rather than prohibition and disproportionate punishment.

Better festive than fatal.

Better festive than fatal.Credit: Amy Harris/Invision/AP)

The drugs that pose the biggest threat to lives are legal – alcohol, tobacco and opioids – but illegal hallucinogenic and stimulatory substances, usually in the form of pills or powders, can be prevalent at festivals. So, one sensible safety measure is to provide a reliable pill-testing service. International evidence shows that to be not only life-saving, but to save public funds by relieving unnecessary pressure on already overloaded hospital emergency departments.

A trial earlier this year in the ACT was declared a success by the police chief. Yet federal Health Minister Greg Hunt is refusing to even countenance expanding the trial, despite growing calls from experts for fundamental changes in drug policy. He should reconsider his position. Advocating harm minimisation does not imply encouragement or endorsement of substance misuse. The safest and sagest approach is not to take drugs. But the unavoidable truth is that the history of drug-taking is as old as humanity, and will not be eradicated by edict or law. Or war. The 50-year-old ‘‘war on drugs’’, launched by then US president Richard Nixon, is one of the most costly – in terms of lives and public funds – failures in the history of public policy.

Politicians privately acknowledge persisting with prohibition is pointless and negligent. More nations are adopting the policy that has led to a decline in drug use, overdoses deaths, crime and addiction in Portugal. A key is to divert the money saved in law enforcement and emergency response into health services, including medically supervised safe injecting centres. There’s never been a recorded overdose death in such a space anywhere in the world, and three in four users seek the help of health professionals to find a path to recovery. Putting people in need with people who can help reduces drug use. Ciminalising drug use does not halt it. It creates a thriving, unregulated market in which sellers profiteer and buyers die, unprotected, unaided and alienated.

Pill testing is one of 13 recommendations in a report last year by Australia 21 – an independent public policy research body. Its overarching advice reflects international best practice – decriminalising drug use and regulating the supply and quality of currently illicit substances. The panel was convened by former AFP commissioner Mick Palmer, one of the eminent signatories to an open letter this week urging all Australian governments to consider pill testing.

Only last week in Sydney, two young Australians died, others became critically ill and as many as 700 were medically treated after taking drugs at a music festival. Trialling pill testing across music festivals this summer would reduce funerals this summer.

  • A note from the editor – Subscribers can get Age editor Alex Lavelle's exclusive weekly newsletter delivered to their inbox by signing up here: www.theage.com.au/editornote

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