HARM REDUCTION
LONG HOT SUMMER
Summer weather and lack of other entertainment mean
that young people are once again turning to outdoor
partying on a large scale. Drug services are going to have
to get creative about harm reduction, says Kevin Flemen
Stephen Arnold
between promoters, police and
welfare services.
This festival harm reduction
doesn’t translocate to illegal
events quite as easily, especially in
the current climate. Clandestine
events may be organised online
with the final location announced
at the last minute. Organisers are
understandably wary of engaging
with any statutory bodies –
wariness that is likely to extend to
drug services. Even where workers
or volunteers could gain access, their
own safety needs to be ensured in
terms of COVID-19, personal safety
and not getting caught up in any
enforcement action. There had been
concern that scarcity of precursor
chemicals could mean a shortage
of MDMA and the re-emergence of
more dangerous compounds such
as PMMA. Conversely there have
also been reports of extremely highpotency
pills, with peak doses in
excess of 350mg being reported.
Without any doubt, as we
exit lockdown, the explosion in
unlicensed events will be the issue to
contend with and drug services need
to engage with this fast, creatively
and at a grassroots level, if they are to
provide much-needed input.
Kevin Flemen runs the drugs
education and training initiative KFx
www.kfx.org.uk
In many post-apocalyptic films
there’s an unbearably naff
sequence where everyone
has a party. It’s like The Matrix
Reloaded ‘Zion dance party’
and usually involves everyone
getting into tribal drumming and
showing off their tattoos. It turns
out that all these scriptwriters were,
in fact, absolutely on the money.
While the COVID-19 pandemic
is nowhere near over and social
distancing is still in theory the order
of the day, we’re at the Zion dance
party stage of proceedings.
A few weeks ago I ran a ‘young
people and drugs’ webinar and
one of the things I flagged up
was the likelihood as we exited
lockdown of unlicensed events
becoming a bigger issue. One
participant highlighted that it was
already happening in Bristol – that
was a month ago. Since then the
prediction has come to pass and
there has been a massive upsurge
in house parties, block parties,
illegal raves and spontaneous
open-air events. Some of these
have made the national news, but
the media attention has so far
mostly been on litter and conflict
with the police – the issue of
drugs and safety has not yet been
discussed so widely.
The upsurge in unlicensed music
events should come as no surprise.
Pubs are only now reopening on a
restricted basis, nightclubs won’t
be reopening for the foreseeable
future and organised festivals
have been cancelled. A cohort of
people who have been furloughed,
have lost work or are entering the
summer unclear if they are going
on to higher education are bored
and craving social interaction and
entertainment. And the weather’s
hot. Partying outside is very clearly
going to be the order of the day.
The drug harm reduction input
at some organised events prelockdown
has been very successful
in making festivals and clubs
much safer. Onsite drug testing,
festival welfare, trained staff and
harm reduction interventions
were helping to raise awareness of,
and reduce the risks from, highstrength
pills and powders and pills
containing unknown and possibly
dangerous cuts, as well as providing
help to those in distress. The best of
these were collaborative exercises
Given that unlicensed events are going to be one of the issues over
the summer months, interventions are essential. And the ‘how to’
for working with unlicensed events means revisiting earlier harm
reduction and being less reliant on permitted access and high-tech
onsite testing. It’s going to need to be more grassroots, including:
• production of clear accessible literature
• use of testing sites such as WEDINOS, Pill Reports and The
Loop to promote awareness of contaminated pills, highstrength
and other dangerous products
• safety advice about use of nitrous oxide
• engaging with promoters via social media so that they
can make events safer – water onsite, access for emergency
services, trained volunteers and engaging with drug services to
provide outreach if possible
• peer education – as, more often than not, drug services won’t
be on site it’s essential to equip those attending events with
the resources and tools to manage critical incidents. Making
sure attendees know how to spot signs of MDMA overdose and
manage it is critical
• using What3Words https://what3words.com/ to ensure that
emergency services can locate people at outdoor events with
pinpoint accuracy
• general harm reduction with a view to addressing COVID-19
spread including the sharing of snorting tubes, spliffs, drinks
and balloons
• legal advice cards such as Release ‘Bust Cards’ so that people
detained during enforcement activity know their rights and
can access legal advice
• personal safety advice
WWW.DRINKANDDRUGSNEWS.COM JULY/AUGUST 2020 • DRINK AND DRUGS NEWS • 9