Time for a fresh approach to club drugs

Last week it was announced that fabric would be reopening “soon”, along with an extensive new licensing agreement. Particularly salient for students in London is the new block on under 19s from entering on club nights and the lifetime bans for those found with drugs on them or attempting to purchase drugs within the club. The recent saga of closure, #saveourculture campaign, and reopening was triggered by the deaths of two 18-year-olds (in separate incidents) at the club over the summer. In light of this, while I’m ecstatic that one of London’s top dance venues is reopening its doors, I can’t help but feel that both the club and the council missed an opportunity to champion a more logical approach to club drug use. Clearly everyone has agreed that stopping deaths at the club is the priority, but how much are the new measures really going to help?

The club is already infamous for its thorough search procedures on entry: many times I have experienced rather more intimate touching than I would like without having had a drink bought for me. In fact, fabric has been commended by a district judge on its industry-leading approach to drug searches and security. However, updated measures include increased CCTV surveillance and “Search Captains”, which apart from allowing clubbers to empathise with victims of the Stasi, I doubt will have any impact on drug abuse at the club. Tighter prohibition will merely drive drug use further under the radar. Facing a lifetime ban if caught at the door, surely clubbers will just ingest the currently fashionable upper before they reach the end of the queue. If anything, this is more likely to make them overdose - think how many friends haven’t managed to make it out after pre-drinks. Kicking young, insensible drug users out of clubs and onto the streets or into warehouses will only lead to more harm. Inside a club, they can at least be monitored by staff and cared for until help arrives.

Drug charity The Loop provides drug testing and welfare at music events, and was extensively involved in the licensing review process. In 2013, its director Professor Fiona Measham provided drug testing at the Warehouse Project in Manchester, one of the largest dance music events in the UK. Tests are done to determine the purity of drugs handed into amnesty boxes near the entrance of the venue. If this strategy was used more widely, the results could be posted in real time, alerting clubbers to particularly impure or dangerous batches of pills. A common impurity in ecstasy pills is PMA, which is fatal at much lower doses than MDMA. This strategy would have a two-pronged effect on club drugs, forcing shady dealers to increase the purity and quality of their drugs, further leading to less chance of accidental overdose.

Police, clubbers, and venues have the same objective: reducing harm from drug use. It’s time for a logical, health-centred approach to this aim. Prohibition has failed to stop deaths and will continue to fail. The 1994 Criminal Justice and Public Order Act was created to close down illegal, underground raves and music events. This led to the establishment of venues like fabric, which present a safer environment for lovers of dance music to let loose. The increasingly oppressive response to drug use will only lead to the return of illegal, unlicensed events, which lack the staff or facilities to help clubbers that go too far.

Opponents of anonymous drug testing assert that it encourages use of dangerous illegal drugs, but let’s be honest and ask ourselves how well the current approach is working to prevent it. Findings by the Crime Survey of England and Wales showed that in 2015, ecstasy use by young adults had increased by 84% since the year before. A more pragmatic and compassionate approach to drug use is the route to preventing harm. Drug testing would provide useful information to users about the risks associated with the drugs they’re taking. It’s hard not to compare drug prohibition with the failure of abstinence based approaches to pre-marital sex. It’s time to quit the puritanical crusade against drug use and start safeguarding drug users, otherwise we’ll keep losing young lives to dodgy pills.