Items tagged with drug testing

Item title Description
Overwhelming majority of voters support pill-testing – Guardian Essential poll [15.01.2019] An overwhelming majority of voters in the latest Guardian Essential poll say they support pill testing in Australia. The survey of 1,089 respondents,...
Music festivals are offering to test the safety of people’s drugs, and police increasingly like the idea [04.01.2019] For a long time, authorities at festivals in Australia and elsewhere almost entirely focused on preventing people from taking drugs in the first plac...
New Zealand embraces pill testing as Australian politicians resist [03.01.2019] As Australian politicians continue to rule out pill testing at music festivals, New Zealand appears to be embracing the controversial practice. The c...
Police Minister Stuart Nash wants drug testing kits at all music festivals by next summer [02.01.2019] Police Minister Stuart Nash wants to see all New Zealand music festivals kitted out with drug testing kits by next summer. This has been welcomed by ...
Testing drugs at festivals is ‘a lifesaver’, study finds [09.12.2018] An alarming rise in drug-related deaths at music festivals can be countered by testing illicit substances onsite, according to the first academic stu...
NCA's decision on pill testing betrays public trust [29.09.2018] The National Capital Authority has blocked a proposal for pill testing at this year's Spilt Milk festival in Canberra. It was able to do this because...
Britain's drug testing charity is ready to roll out in Australia [20.09.2018] Pill testing at music festivals in Australia is inevitable, Britain's only drug-testing organisation says. Two people died from suspected drug overdo...
Canada approves roadside saliva test for cannabis that doesn't measure impairment [28.08.2018] The federal government says that "combatting impaired driving is a top priority". But today, Justice Minister Jody Wilson-Raybould approved a roadsid...
Government won't 'stand in the way' of drug testing at festivals, says Home Office [09.07.2018] The Home Office “would not stand in the way” of drug testing at clubs and festivals, it said. It follows calls from experts and campaigners for music...
Drugs should not be in the hands of organized crime [25.02.2018] Drug overdoses are one of the leading causes of death in the United States and are contributing to decline in life expectancy. The opioid epidemic ha...
Plans for heroin to be prescribed to addicts in West Midlands [12.02.2018] Doctors in the West Midlands could soon be prescribing heroin for addicts, who would be invited to inject themselves with clean syringes in drug cons...
A huge step backward on opioids [24.01.2018] The latest statistics on the overdose crisis -- roughly 64,000 deaths in the United States in 2016 -- also reveal that fentanyl and other synthetic o...
Portugal’s radical drugs policy is working. Why hasn’t the world copied it? [05.12.2017] In 2001, Portugal became the first country to decriminalise the possession and consumption of all illicit substances. Rather than being arrested, tho...
Testing of illicit drugs to be done at Australian event for first time [22.09.2017] The Australian Capital Territory (ACT) government has agreed to allow pill testing at a coming music festival, in an effort to reduce deaths and harm...
We already know how to stop people dying from drugs – but the Government refuses to do it [02.08.2017] Last year saw the highest number of drug-related deaths since records began in 1993. More than half of these deaths involved an opiate, such as heroi...
Support users, don't punish them: Ex-AFP boss' radical ideas to beat the drug trade [13.06.2017] For over half a century governments in Australia have relied heavily on law enforcement to curb the drug trade and reduce drug use. But despite huge ...
More fentanyl being found in MDMA, crystal meth in Victoria [12.06.2017] When Victoria pharmacist Alain Vincent began testing local street drugs for the presence of fentanyl, he knew it would be found in heroin. He was sur...
An experiment helps heroin users test their street drugs for fentanyl [16.05.2017] Fentanyl is a synthetic opioid that is "similar to morphine but can be 50 to 100 times more potent," according to the National Institute on Drug Abus...
Pot ban on drivers won’t work, health experts say [07.11.2016] It would be unrealistic to bar drivers from having any trace of marijuana in their system when it becomes legal in Canada, as B.C. has suggested, bec...
Drug-testing at music festivals: Cocaine or concrete? [29.07.2016] Backstage at many of Britain’s summer music festivals, suspicious pills and powders seized from tents are analysed by lab technicians. Usually it is ...
Ecstasy is getting stronger, drug testing clinic warns [02.05.2016] The amount of active ingredients in ecstasy pills in the Netherlands has almost doubled in 10 years, according to the Trimbos addiction institute, wh...
Pill testing trial to begin at Sydney music festivals, vows drug expert Alex Wodak [27.02.2016] The Australian drug expert who pioneered the nation's first legal injecting centre is on a collision course with the Baird government and NSW Police ...
Why Canada is no longer a leader in global drug policy [26.02.2015] Prime Minister Stephen Harper’s statement about the failures of Canada's drug policy is mostly on point. It’s just the last bit he gets wrong: “I thi...
New Zealand’s psychoactive substances legislation [31.08.2013] On 11 July 2013, the New Zealand Parliament passed the Psychoactive Substances Act. The legislation enacted a new legal framework for the testing, ma...
Experts: Zero-tolerance on ‘cannabis driving’ too severe [04.11.2012] Experts are questioning the severity of a zero-tolerance policy towards those caught driving with detectable levels of illegal drugs in their bodies,...
Is banning legal highs effective? [19.01.2012] New psychoactive substances (commonly known as legal highs) are spreading across Europe with growing speed. Between 1997 and 2010 the early-warning s...
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