Precis

While Australia is investigating a spate of recent drug-related deaths at festivals, Triple J presenter Tom Tilley heads to Europe and the UK to find out how countries over there are dealing with the challenge.

Summertime in Europe means festival season is peaking. On most weekends, tens of thousands of people, young and old, come together to experience live music and culture.

“It’s not like, ‘Are you going to a festival?’ It’s, ‘Which festivals are you going to?’” says Anna Wade, an organiser from Boomtown Fair in the UK.

But with festivals comes drug use and risk. Research by The Loop, a not for profit drug testing service in the UK, suggests around half of festival-goers in the UK use illegal drugs.

“We do [drugs] to enhance the experience, to enjoy ourselves, to live life,” says one party-goer at Boomtown Fair, who’s smuggled several illegal substances into the event.

In England, Tom goes behind the scenes at Boomtown Fair, one of the country’s biggest festivals, joining 66,000 partygoers over five days. With a history of drug deaths, Boomtown is now taking a pro-active approach to keeping its revellers safe.

Comprehensive medical emergency facilities, roving welfare staff and back-of house drug testing all come together in its multi-agency approach.

But this year, a key piece of Boomtown’s safety strategy – its front-of-house drug testing service - where punters take their personal stash to be tested out in the open – falls through at the last minute.

“It does worry me that someone could die this weekend,” says one young woman.

A short plane ride away, on the same weekend in Switzerland, Tom discovers a very different approach. He joins one million people partying in the streets of Zurich and finds drug testing services operating out in the open. They’re government-run and free, and the party-goers are queuing up.

In this colourful episode of Foreign Correspondent, Tom Tilley takes us inside festival culture and asks, how can we keep our young people safe?

Festival crowd

00:00

TOM TILLEY, Reporter:  It’s summertime in Europe and festival season's going off.

00:05

For many, that means taking drugs.

00:15

Vox pop with guy at festival

GUY:  Teenagers running around thinking they can just take what they want. They think they’re invincible, don't they?

00:20

Vox pop Ciara

CIARA: It does worry me that someone could die this weekend.

00:27

Festival crowd

TOM TILLEY, Reporter:  I’ve been reporting on music festival drug deaths for over five years. A recent spate of deaths

00:31

Pill testing facility

has turbo-charged the debate about pill testing. Does it save lives, or give a green light to drug use?

00:38

Tilley at festival pill testing facility

TOM: What made you want to do this?

00:47

BEN: I just want to be safe when I take my drugs, because you never know what’s inside.

00:49

Festival crowd dance

TOM TILLEY, Reporter:  In this program we’ll go deep into the European and UK festival scene to see drug testing in action, and to find out what else organisers are doing to stop people dying.

00:53

Drone shot over English countryside

01:09

Gates open to Boomtown Fair. Festivalgoers in through gates

SECURITY GUY: Big it up, Boomtown massive!

01:19

Super:  Boomtown Fair, UK

Music

01:22

Tilley at festival . Super:
Tom Tilley

01:33

Drone shot over festival. Title:
TESTING TIMES

01:34

Tilley to camera at festival. Blonde woman interrupts

TOM TILLEY, Reporter:  Alright, so the gates are open; tens of thousands of people are flooding in. And for the next five days, this…

GIRL: Oh, are we on a broadcast?

TOM: Oh yeah, we’re live.

GIRL: Oh yah. What are we doing?

TOM: We’re at Boomtown Fair.

GIRL: Of course we are. I didn’t line up for fucking three hours for no reason!

01:42

Tilley to camera at festival

TOM TILLEY, Reporter:  For the next five days, this is Boomtown Fair.

02:00

Festivalgoers

GUY: Boomtown fair bruv, nice that’s what it is. You know what it is.

02:03

Security guy directs festivalgoers

SECURITY GUY:  Keep on walking that way. Whoever it is, they will meet you… if they want to. And if they don't, you're in the festival already. Big it up, Boomtown massive!

02:07

GVs Boomtown Fair

TOM TILLEY, Reporter:  In just 11 years Boomtown's become one of the biggest festivals in the UK. The place is enormous, it’s like a temporary city, with nine themed districts, more than 80 stages and venues, and 66,000 people.

02:22

Ext.  Festival admin office

ANNA WADE, Boomtown Fair: We’re looking into what our line is on that is at the moment ,so checking in with security and that lot.

02:46

Festival organisers and Anna in office

TOM TILLEY, Reporter:  Thousands of staff and volunteers pull it all together, including Anna Wade who’s been with Boomtown since its beginnings.

02:51

ANNA WADE, Boomtown Fair::  The festival culture in the UK, over the last five or 10 years, it’s really grown to being actually what everybody does now.

05:59

Anna interview

Now it’s not like, “Are you going to a festival?” It’s, “Which festivals are you going to?”

03:05

Rose and Marcus unpack car

TOM TILLEY, Reporter:  Rose and Marcus are festival regulars; this is their second year at Boomtown.

03:14

Rose pulls camping equipment

ROSE:  You immediately get here and it’s just don’t hold back, there’s no holding back at this festival.

03:23

ROSE: Don’t film me struggle!

GUY #1: Come on, you can do it guys. Get it up there. I have faith in you all. I love you.

03:28

Guy to camera

GUY #2:  Fucking Boomtown, yes brother.

03:36

Rose and Marcus set up camp

ROSE: Get some tent pegs, make yourself useful.

03:39

TOM TILLEY, Reporter: They've got their tent, their wet weather gear for the classic English summer, and their drugs.

03:43

TOM TILLEY, Reporter: So are drugs an important part of the mix for you guys?

03:50

Tilley with Rose and Marcus

MARCUS: They're not key. We come for the music. They enhance-

ROSE: Yeah. It's-

MARCUS: They enhance our time here. It makes everything feel better.

03:54

I mean there are people that go too far and they do too much and they have a bad time. But that’s not us, we don't do that, we’re sensible.

04:03

Group of festivalgoers chant then drink

[Girls chant]

04:11

Tilley walks with Rose and Marcus

TOM TILLEY, Reporter:  Surveys show about half of people at music festivals in the UK are using illicit drugs.  Marcus and Rose managed to smuggle their stash in by hiding it internally.

04:29

Rose shows drugs to Tilley

ROSE: Well what you do you see, you just neaten it all up like this and you just neaten it up like that, and roll it all together and boom, it looks like a dick. And a very small one at that! I mean, no offence anyone, sorry.

04:40

TOM TILLEY, Reporter:  They’ve brought MDMA - the active ingredient in ecstasy, ketamine -- an anaesthetic used recreationally -- and cannabis.

05:00

TOM TILLEY, Reporter:  Okay, and how much Ketamine is that? 

ROSE: That's about four grams. So we've got two each, basically.

05:09

TOM TILLEY, Reporter: So you know that a young woman, died from taking Ketamine at this festival? That doesn't worry you?

MARCUS: It sounds quite bad, but...

05:16

ROSE: We would never do a drug that we've never done before at a festival. We would always do it in a comfortable environment at home, or at a party, or with friends, to test to see how we get on with it, and that's what we would do.

05:30

Festival GVs

Music 

05:50

TOM TILLEY, Reporter:  Underneath the colour of Boomtown is a tragic history.  In the six years to 2016, four people died from drug-related causes. 

06:10

Speakers Corner tent

WENDY: She was a very vibrant happy soul,

06:21

Wendy and Iona on stage in Speakers Corner tent

she was highly intelligent, she was a bit lazy, she had a bit of an attitude, but oh my god, she was charming.

06:27

TOM TILLEY, Reporter:  Ellie Rowe’s mother Wendy and her sister Iona come back to Boomtown every year to remember her.

06:33

WENDY:  I’m sorry, I can never tell this with a straight face, but that’s why I’m here, to just express how painful it is to be told that your child has died.

06:41

TOM TILLEY, Reporter:  Ellie was just 18 when she died at Boomtown in 2013. She’d had two beers, and a line of ketamine. 

06:50

Iona on stage

IONA ROWE:  It was in the mid-range of what they would give a child in hospital. It was, you know, one big line. And in her system it should have been fine. But with the alcohol, he said it was as if she had forgotten to breathe. It wasn't an overdose, it wasn't a cry for help, it was just curiosity, and a healthy amount of curiosity that’s within every child.

07:00

ANNA WADE, Boomtown Fair:  Ellie Rowe in 2013,

07:29

Anna interview. Super:
Anna Wade
Boomtown Fair

was a very -- it was a moment, a big moment, especially for myself, when it all became very apparent that more needs to be done.

07:32

Festivalgoers walk past Boomtown sign

TOM TILLEY, Reporter:  Boomtown recruited retired police officer Paul Bunt

07:42

Paul driving

to overhaul its approach to drugs and crime. Before that, he'd spent decades policing drugs.

PAUL BUNT:  We have a duty

07:47

under the Misuse of Drugs Act to make sure that drugs don't enter the site.

07:59

Security dog handler

DOG HANDLER: Okay, young man what have you got on you? Same thing? Bit of weed? Whereabouts is it, in the bag? In that bag. Lovely, thank you.

08:03

Paul interview

PAUL BUNT:  Some may have the view that if we seize as many drugs as we can, that reduces the amount on site. That's true, but what that means is they go onto site and they look for a dealer.

08:13

It is ridiculous to think that we can stop all drugs coming into the festival.

08:30

A big thing in the UK over the last two or three years is the amount of drugs getting into a prison. Well, if it can get into a prison, it's going to get into a festival.

08:35

Festival GVs

Music

08:44

Medica with siren through festival

09:18

Boomtown organisers meeting

TOM TILLEY, Reporter:  To keep people safe, Boomtown assembles its team to talk strategy.

09:28

Paul in meeting

PAUL BUNT:  We plan to update you at least once a day, hopefully twice a day, on what we’re finding.

09:33

TOM TILLEY, Reporter:  The heads of security, medical, communications, crime and drugs are all discussing how their different services will work together over the next five days.

09:38

Craig in meeting

CRAIG: At Hilltop there is a 14 bed field hospital.

09:49

TOM TILLEY, Reporter:  A key pillar of Boomtown’s harm reduction strategy, is its full on-site emergency department.

09:53

Medics in festival emergency department

Craig Harris has been leading the medical team at Boomtown for over 10 years. 

TOM TILLEY, Reporter: So how many people can you have on life support at one time in here?

09:59

Tilley with Craig in festival emergency department

CRAIG: We've got three resuscitation bays, so effectively, we could deal with three really, really unwell patients all at the same time. Having that high level of emergency care consultants, intensive care consultants actually onsite means that we can stabilize them before we transfer to appropriate receiving hospitals.

10:11

We're very, very keen in the UK to get, certainly bring the level of clinical care to festivals up, and we're striving to make this better.

10:31

Security advisor wheels drug confiscation bin for testing

TOM TILLEY, Reporter:  Medical facilities are just one element. In 2017, Boomtown introduced ‘back of house’ drug testing to provide intel on what drugs are in circulation. They test drugs confiscated at the gates and found in amnesty bins. The testing happens well away from festivalgoers, inside the police compound.

10:40

Tilley at drug testing facility

And here we are in the back of house facility, run by an organisation called Tic Tac. Let’s go see what they do.  

11:08

Security advisor unpacks drugs for Trevor

11:15

TOM TILLEY, Reporter:  Trevor Shine is the Director of Tic Tac, a private drug analysis and identification business.

Trevor, we’ve got another sample here, what is it?

11:20

Trevor and Tilley with drug samples

TREVOR SHINE, Tic Tac: It looks as if it’s crystal MDMA, and we’re going to run that on an infrared spectrometer. It probably could just as easily be n-ethylpentylone because the two look similar.

11:30

Testing drugs

TOM TILLEY, Reporter:  Substances like N-ethylpentylone and PMMA aren’t seen often, but when they are, they’re usually passed off as MDMA. PMMA is more toxic, and N-ethylpentylone much longer-lasting.

11:43

TREVOR SHINE, Tic Tac: You have someone who's expecting crystal MDMA, which should be a four or five hour

11:58

Trevor interview

kind of mellow stimulant high, great for dancing and things, and what they get instead is a very edgy amphetamine-like high that can last 12 to 14 hours, and that’s the problem because they’re not expecting it.

12:04

Drug test results on computer

TOM TILLEY, Reporter:  Ok so we’ve got the results, Trevor you were right, MDMA.

12:20

TREVOR SHINE: I was, this time.

12:24

Drug testing GVs

TOM TILLEY, Reporter:  If Trevor and his team find a harmful substance, they tell the festival, which then sends an alert to the on-site teams. They also warn the public, via signage and social media.

12:28

Trevor interview

TOM TILLEY, Reporter: Do you think that helps? Do you think that could save a life?

TREVOR SHINE, Tic Tac: It's hard to say if it could save a life, to be honest with you. It could save someone, possibly save their life. If an ecstasy tablet was picked up, and there was PMMA in it, which is pretty lethal, you might be able to say we've saved someone's life.

12:41

Festival GVs. Crowd dancing

Music

13:02

Front of house drug testing facility

TOM TILLEY, Reporter:  The most popular part of Boomtown’s drug strategy has been its ‘front of house’ drug testing, which is designed to work in combination with the ‘back of house’ team.  The idea is that festivalgoers themselves bring their drugs to be tested here, in the middle of the festival, where police agree not to arrest them.

13:37

Anna interview

ANNA WADE, Boomtown Fair: it just really helped us open up and have actually peer to peer conversations with people, rather than the authoritative “Don’t do drugs. Don’t bring them in this festival,” which wasn’t working. It obviously wasn’t working.

13:58

Festivalgoers read drug info

TOM TILLEY, Reporter:  But it’s controversial. And seeing how official this set up looks, you can understand why some people are concerned that it’s endorsing -- or even encouraging -- drug use.

TREVOR SHINE, Tic Tac:  I'm mildly against it,

14:12

Trevor interview. Super:
Trevor Shine
Tic Tac

because I think it does normalise drug use. That doesn't mean that I don't see the advantages of doing it, or the benefits of doing it. That's just my personal view, and I can't see how it doesn't, because it has to, to a degree, in my opinion.

14:27

Festivalgoers read drug info

ANNA WADE, Boomtown Fair:  You may think it's promoting, or endorsing drug use, but when you actually fully recognise and see what the service is,

14:45

Anna interview. Super:
Anna Wade
Boomtown Fair

everybody will see it as the public health service and offering that it actually is.

14:56

Festivalgoers read drug info at testing facility

15:04

TOM TILLEY, Reporter:  This 'front of house' testing is run by a not-for-profit called The Loop -- the only organisation to offer it in the UK. But at the last minute, Boomtown announces that the service won’t be testing this year.

15:10

Vox pops with festivalgoers

GUY #1: They can’t test our drugs so our safety net has gone, and that’s scary.

GUY #2: Realistically, I was going to come down here with all of my mates’ shit, and I was going to go in there to test it for them, just to make sure that no one’s going to, you know, die.

15:25

CIARA:   I heard in the news that someone died at a festival in Ireland last week, and I think it’s terrible and it does worry me that someone could die this weekend, because people don’t know what they’re taking, and they don’t have an education about it.

15:36

Iona and Wendy interview

IONA ROWE:  I'm scared, because last year there was no deaths and we stood outside The Loop for ages just observing young people that had had their drugs tested, the conversations that followed, and it was really exciting. Just gave me so much hope, I left last year's Boomtown with a heart full of hope, which I had never imagined would happen. Then to hear the news that it wasn't on this year, my instant reaction was fear because I hate—I just can't--

15:52

WENDY: Every death it's like Eleanor dies all over again. Every time we read of some young person dying through drugs.

16:26

Festival GVs

Music

16:33

TOM TILLEY, Reporter:  Up until now, The Loop’s been operating in a legal grey area.  Director Fiona Measham says The Loop applied for a Government licence this year, but it hasn’t been approved yet.

FIONA MEASHAM, The Loop: We’ve been working for the past six years

16:40

Fiona interview

to get to a point where we can do safety testing across the UK. But it has been a massive struggle behind the scenes every single time, because you think about all the different stakeholders we have to engage with, we have to have public health, local authorities, police and also the festival themselves, so it’s a really, really complex situation.

16:55

Festival GVs

TOM TILLEY, Reporter:  As a compromise, The Loop is offering drug counselling, normally the last step in their testing service.

17:12

Tilley with Rose and Marcus

Are you guys disappointed that The Loop won’t be drug testing this year?

17:26

ROSE: It’s devastating because it’s, all of our, all of our age group love it. We love The Loop, and we love the fact that you can get your drugs tested scientifically and get after care. And it’s a huge step backwards.

17:29

TOM TILLEY, Reporter:  Will you still be interested in going down and getting the counselling session?

ROSE: Yes.

TOM TILLEY, Reporter: You would?

ROSE: Yep.

17:43

Tilley walks with Rose and Marcus to counselling facility

TOM TILLEY, Reporter:  The Loop says its service reduces drug consumption.  When it first started at Boomtown in 2017, 44 per cent of the people that came in said they’d discard their drugs completely, or reduce their dose.

17:47

Rose and Marcus in counselling session at The Loop

LILY: Which substance do you expect to take first?

ROSE: Ketamine.

18:02

ADAM: One of the things with the combination of alcohol and ketamine that people often forget, when the two are combined together the effects magnify a lot. So people often end up in welfare, because they’re throwing up, they’re unconscious and it does result in a disproportionately high number of fatalities. So it's definitely a combination to be particularly careful about.

18:09

Rose and Marcus with Tilley after counselling

TOM TILLEY, Reporter:  So was it any use without the testing?

ROSE: It was. I learned something. I learned something that I will not do.

TOM TILLEY, Reporter:  And what's that?

ROSE: Not mix alcohol with any other drugs. That I didn't know.

MARCUS:  She's also decided that she's not going to take one of our drugs.

ROSE: MDMA. I'm not going to do MDMA, because I found out that it interacts with the medication I'm on, so I'm not going to take it.

18:30

TOM TILLEY, Reporter:  Wow. That sounds like vital information.

ROSE: It really is vital information. It's something that I tried to look for on the Internet and I couldn't find it. And she gave me the answer, so I'm not going to do it.

18:55

Zurich street parade GV

Music

19:03

TOM TILLEY, Reporter:  While the UK grapples with the issue of drug testing, just a short flight away on the same weekend, it’s a very different story.

19:10

Super:
Zurich, Switzerland

Music

19:19

Huge crowds in Zurich, GVs

19:23

Tilley to camera

TOM TILLEY, Reporter:  This is the annual Zurich street parade, there’s around one million people partying on the streets here. And in amongst it is a drug testing service right out in the open.

19:37

Drug testing facility at festival

This service is funded by local government, and it's been running for 18 years.  It’s headed up by Director Christian Kobel. 

19:47

Kobel interview

CHRISTIAN KOBEL:  It’s going very good. There’s a lot of people attending the booths, we’re non-stop doing analysis.

19:57

Drug testing facility

TOM TILLEY, Reporter:  Partygoers walk straight up to the tent with their drugs, and the police agree not to arrest them.

20:03

Tilley with young man

What made you want to do this?

GUY: I just want to be safe when I take my drugs, because you never know what’s inside. Maybe if the results come back and they’re like very strong, I will take maybe a little less. And if it’s like cut with something dangerous, then I’m just going to not take it.

20:11

Drug testing procedure

TOM TILLEY, Reporter:  Once the drugs are handed over, the first step is documentation. Then a sample of the pill or powder is processed into a liquid form and analysed to find out what’s in it.  The test takes around 20 minutes. And then it’s time for results.

20:27

Kobel interview

CHRISTIAN KOBEL:  I guess that's the most important part, when we hand out the results after testing, that's where we give the safer use tips, where we hand out the important information so they can reduce their risks.

TOM TILLEY, Reporter:  And do you personalize that information for that individual?

20:46

CHRISTIAN KOBEL:   Yeah, this information is personalised to the individual. For example, we take into consideration the body weight, medical history.

21:00

Drug testing facility

TOM TILLEY, Reporter:  Ninety-four drug samples were tested today -- a third of them revealed very high strength MDMA.

CHRISTIAN KOBEL:   So we will tell the people

21:09

Kobel interview

just take a third of this pill, don't take more, that's more than enough concerning your body weight. Wait at least for an hour to feel the full effect of the substance before you take anything more. Don't mix with other substances, drink some water, take some rest if you don't feel good. Come back to our booth if you don't feel good.

21:18

Street party GVs

Music

21:36

TOM TILLEY, Reporter:  What about people who are concerned that this kind of testing service gives a green light to drug taking?

CHRISTIAN KOBEL:  Data analysis we have from the questionnaires

21:41

Kobel interview

we know that people usually start at an early age. There is two or three years in between since their first use of those party drugs and using the drug checking services. So I think that it's very clear that this cannot be the green light, forcing them or encouraging them to do drugs.

21:49

Drug info on board at facility

TOM TILLEY, Reporter:  Switzerland isn’t alone - 11 other European countries also allow drug testing.

22:08

So what do you think of this idea of drug checking the middle of a festival?

22:18

Vox pop with female festivalgoer

GIRL: I think it’s incredible. Like everyone's on drugs regardless. So if you're checking to be sure that there's not anything crazy, like laced, anything weird, any chemicals that you don't want to be taking in your body, it's a perfect way to know what's going on.

TOM TILLEY, Reporter:  And where are you from?

GIRL: I'm from New York.

22:23

TOM TILLEY, Reporter:  Do you have this in New York.

GIRL: No, we don’t it.

22:43

Street party GVs

Music

22:46

TOM TILLEY, Reporter:  Organisers say there’s never been a drug-related death at an event where they’ve been testing. 

22:52

Boomtown drone shots. Super:
Boomtown Fair, UK

Music

23:03

Festival GVs

Back at Boomtown, the festival is really hitting its straps.

23:17

Music

23:22

Rose, Marcus and friends

ROSE: It’s Saturday and it’s great, isn’t it!

FRIEND: It’s fucking amazing!

23:33

ROSE: We just got done dancing and now we need to go somewhere and get rid of some energy and dance some more.

23:37

ROSE & FRIENDS:   “Boomtown!”

23:43

Drug testing team at work

TOM TILLEY, Reporter:  Meanwhile, the ‘back of house’ drug testing team have found some of those nasty substances that were on the radar.

23:45

Trevor with drugs interview

TREVOR SHINE, Tic Tac:  One are these superman ecstasy tablets. We think that they may contain a drug called PMMA, similar to MDMA, except considerably more toxic, and it has been associated with deaths in a number of countries across the world.  The other substance is n-ethylpentylone, which happily, we hadn’t seen any of until yesterday.

23:54

Paul enters and meets with Trevor

TOM TILLEY, Reporter:  Trevor’s called Boomtown’s Crime and Drugs manager Paul Bunt, who decides to put out some alerts.

24:17

TREVOR SHINE, Tic Tac: It’s not a lot but then, you don’t need a lot.

PAUL: Don’t need a lot of it, do we. No, our experience over the last two years tells us that, so, okay.

24:29

The Loop team designing information alerts

 TOM TILLEY, Reporter:  Over at The Loop, the team designs and words the alerts.

24:39

LILY: Maybe in bold.

SAM: I’ll swap that round, you’re right.

LILY:  Because the fact that was, who detected perhaps is not the priority, is what is the message behind. 

24:45

Tilley with Loop team

TOM TILLEY, Reporter:  Once you get your message right, the Boomtown organisers will disseminate it through their socials and the festival app.

SAM: We even get visitors or people who have used the service, or people who know of us retweeting it and sharing it. You get a lot of people tagging their mates about posts and sharing that on and that's actually a massive help.

24:56

Tilley to camera

TOM TILLEY, Reporter:  So that alert from The Loop has now gone out on Boomtown Fair’s social media channels. The question is, is anyone out here going to see it?

25:19

Vox pops with festivalgoers

Are you checking Instagram while you’re at the festival?

GIRL: No.

25:26

GUY: I got no phone battery .

25:29

GIRL: Very weak access to the internet.

25:31

Tilley shows guy Loop & Tic Tac message on phone

TOM TILLEY, Reporter:  Is this a handy message, do you think people are going to see it?

25:32

GUY: That would be a handy message yeah, especially it might awaken the little ones up as well, they are the teenagers running around thinking they can just take what they want. They think they’re invincible don’t they after they’ve been drinking.

25:35

Welfare tent

TOM TILLEY, Reporter:  The staff at the welfare tents have got the message.

25:46

Katy with team member

KATY MACLEOD: We’re just re-tweeting that on social media at the moment so if we can just brief the staff so we’ll just do a maybe handover.

TOM TILLEY, Reporter:  Katy MacLeod from Chill Welfare says they’re looking out for n-ethylpentylone symptoms.

KATY MACLEOD:  Based on last year’s findings,

25:50

Katy interview

we saw acute mental health reactions where people hadn’t slept for more 24 hours, and would have, really quite vivid hallucinations.

26:04

Katy with festivalgoer

KATY: Do you want a wee drink of water before you go or anything? Or a cup of tea? Lollipop?

26:12

Drug info on wall

TOM TILLEY, Reporter:  Back at The Loop, and the team have had some useful feedback about the message getting through.

26:19

FIONA MEASHAM, The Loop:  Within an hour of putting out our alerts about the yellow Superman pills,

26:25

Fiona interview. Super:
Fiona Measham
The Loop

people were coming into The Loop service, and they were disposing of those pills with us. Those pills that were handed in, that's the difference between people having a good time at the festival, or having an absolutely terrible time in the medics.

26:28

Tilley walks with Anna

TOM TILLEY, Reporter:  So Anna, here we are. It's the last night of the festival, you're pretty much home. How’s it going?

ANNA WADE, Boomtown Fair: It’s been amazing, actually.

26:45

The conversation has been so out there in terms of The Loop, I mean obviously because of the fact that we haven’t been able to have the front of house drug testing. But, I don't think that's really affected too much everybody's understanding of just how important it is to be educated, and aware of what you're taking.

26:51

Pill bag lying on ground

TOM TILLEY, Reporter:  Despite the absence of front of house drug testing, there’s not much to report from the medical tent. 

CRAIG HARRIS:  Everybody has been treated on scene here by the medical team.

27:06

Craig at medical tent

TOM TILLEY, Reporter: Have you had to use your life support on any drug-related cases?

CRAIG HARRIS: No. We’ve had a couple of patients that have been monitored in our critical care bays, but actually none of the advanced life support equipment has been out of its drawer, I’m very pleased to say.

27:15

Medical tent

TOM TILLEY, Reporter:  After days of partying, we’re checking in with Rose and Marcus.  

27:28

Tilley with Rose and Marcus

ROSE: It’s been the best five days of my life.

TOM TILLEY, Reporter:  Really?

ROSE: Yeah! Of this year, because Boomtown last year.

MARCUS: And this year loads of our friends came so it made it even better.

27:37

TOM TILLEY, Reporter:   You came in with 4 grams of ketamine, how much of that have you used?

ROSE: All of it.

TOM TILLEY, Reporter:  All of it.

MARCUS: Yes, all of it. I gave her mine! I gave her mine.

TOM TILLEY, Reporter:  You’ve had 4 grams of ketamine in the last four days?

ROSE: Yeah.

27:48

TOM TILLEY, Reporter:  How has that made you feel?

ROSE: Great, I feel fine. I feel fine, I’ve woken up in the morning and I’ve been fine. We’ve eaten, we've drunk water, and then we've got on it. And that's it.

TOM TILLEY, Reporter:   Do you worry about the damage that could do to your body in the longer term?

28:03

ROSE: Because I’m not going to do it for the rest of the year. 

28:15

Festival GVs

Music

28:18

TOM TILLEY, Reporter:  Fortunately, everyone here at Boomtown will make it home alive.  But people continue to die from drugs.  Over this summer in the UK, there’ve been at least five suspected drug-related deaths at clubs and festivals.

28:22

Iona and Wendy

IONA ROWE: There's so obviously a need for education and nonjudgmental education. I don't believe that people really want to die. They're not going out, my sister certainly wasn't, absolutely not. She was celebrating life. That was part of it, and her curiosity. But people don’t want to risk their lives.  They want the advice, they want to know how to take care of themselves.

28:40

Festival night shots

Music

29:04

TOM TILLEY, Reporter:  While the drug debate rages, festival culture thrives, and young people continue to push the limits. 

29:11

Credits [see below]

Music

29:20

Outpoint

29:41