Photo via Dan Roxanne
Would you trust a DIY pill testing kit?One 22-year-old Groovin The Moo festivalgoer hopes so. According to a report from Triple J's The Hack blog, a young man has created his own pill-testing kits in order to assist festivalgoers. The harm reduction efforts come after the ACT government blocked plans for laboratory pill testing at the festival.According to the blog, the man purchased chemicals online with money from his mother to create the DIY pill-testing kits for festivalgoers attending the Canberra edition of the festival. The anonymous man also posted a phone number to his Facebook page for those interested in the kits."I can't keep seeing people being hospitalised simply because they've taken something they didn't mean to … if I can do anything to lower that number I feel I have to," he said.However, a DIY pill-testing kit is not a proper solution for laboratory-grade options."There will be numerous other people trying to provide a service which is probably not fit for purpose and the opportunity that has been missed is one where serious, grown up scientists and doctors with the support of law enforcement could have done this in a way that maximized the benefit to the crowd," said emergency specialist Dr. David Caldecott.Chief Minister Andrew Barr continues to defend the ACT government's decision to block a laboratory testing trial. "While there were some general discussions in late 2016 regarding a potential trial of pill testing at an event in the ACT and some preliminary assessment has been done, the ACT Government will not rush a decision on a trial to meet an artificial deadline," Barr said.Last year, we spoke with experts about the future of pill testing in Australia.
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