On March 30, the Home Office, which oversees national criminal justice affairs, announced that GHB will be reclassified from a Class C substance to Class B—making people found to be in possession vulnerable to up to five years in prison, rather than two. Supply and production punishments remain unchanged. Additionally, the department will advocate for legislation that creates a licensing system for the industrial use of GBL and BDO, two GHB precursors. All three chemicals are often referred to collectively as “G.”

The crackdown appears to be a response to a moral panic stoked by media outlets, like Buzzfeed UK, over a so-called “chemsex crimewave.” On January 6, 2020, Home Secretary Priti Patel called on the Advisory Council on the Misuse of Drugs (ACMD) to investigate whether G ought to be reclassified. She cited something that had happened earlier that day: A man named Reynard Sinaga had been sentenced to 30 years-to-life for serially raping queer men, many of whom are believed to have been unconsensually dosed with G. Patel also justified her request by citing Stephen Port and Gerald Motovu, two men who had committed murders facilitated by G.

Patel claims she’s trying to keep people safe. “I will do everything in my power to protect people from harm, which is why I am tightening restrictions around these dangerous substances,” she said in a statement making the announcement. “These changes will make the drugs harder to access and introduce tougher penalties for possession.”

Patel did not explain how the classic drug-war policies—harsher punishments and supply restrictions—will help stop rape. As the vast body of academic research on drug markets has demonstrated, supply-side crackdowns just makes conditions riskier for consumers who tend, invariably, to find what they’re looking for; this is otherwise known as the Iron Law of Prohibition.

More than two decades before Patel’s crackdown, a rape crisis counselor in the United States had known the punitive approach was misguided. “We must deal with the act and not deal with the vehicle specifically that is being used,”  Denise Snyder of the DC Rape Crisis Center told US Congressmembers in March 1998. The lawmakers were consideringd legislation, eventually enacted, to criminalize what a moral panic had branded as a “date-rape drug” due, in part, to misinformation about the deaths of two teenage girls. Snyder continued: “if we focus on specific drugs, I am afraid that what we are going to do is two years down the road find ourselves in the same place that we are in now.”

Patel’s approach will also likely disproportionately impact queer people. In the ACMD’s November 2020 report recommending the enhanced punishment, an unspecified number of advisors opposed the reclassification, in part on the grounds that there will be “unintended impacts of reclassification on those using these compounds—particularly those from the LGBT community and those using these compounds in the Chemsex context specifically.” They added that “These already vulnerable groups could be disproportionately impacted by any changes to the criminal justice system.”

London-based harm reductionist Ignacio Labayen de Inza, director of the organization Controlling Chemsex, is worried about the harm the policy change will have on people in the chemsex community.

“I felt very sad: Do they really believe that everyone who has G at home is a rapist?” he wrote to Filter. “Can’t they see that if the police arrives to a house where there is G, it can be [there] for many different reasons, including someone suffering from GHB dependency, and he needs that drug to function otherwise he will suffer from terrible withdrawal symptoms? So that person, who is already going through lots of difficulties … now he is going to be under more pressure?”

Instead of the harsher penalties for drugs, de Inza says that there needs to be more information and support for people who have been sexually assaulted or are struggling with their chemsex participation. He also believes that the “punishment has to be for the rapist.”

In a March 30 letter to the ACMD chair, Patel acknowledged that their report had made recommendations regarding “improved data, toxicology, prevention, treatment, and training of staff in health and social care.” She stated that Home Office “officials are in discussion with other government departments and agencies to develop a detailed response to these recommendations and I will reply further in due course.” 

Photograph of GHB containers by Filter

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But the Advisory Council on the Misuse of Drugs (ACMD) did not make its recommendation to escalate punitive responses unanimously. An unspecified number of ACMD experts on the Technical Committee, which deliberated GHB-RS’s change in classification under the Misuse of Drugs Act 1971, objected. They warned that intensifying criminalization will only inflict, not reduce, harm—particularly for queer and trans people.

The ACMD was commissioned by UK Home Secretary Priti Patel to investigate GHB-RS at the beginning of 2020—shortly after the conviction of, and ensuing media fixation on, a gay man of color for committing large-scale sexual violence that was allegedly facilitated by GHB-RS. On November 20, the ACMD published its assessment of the harms of GHB-RS and its recommendations in response.

The maximum penalty for possession would increase from two years in prison to five.

GHB-RS are central nervous-system depressants, most popular in queer scenes and nightlife contexts. In 2006, GHB was considered by the country’s parliament to be far less dangerous than most other common party drugs, including alcohol, ketamine, benzos, amphetamine, cannabis and LSD. It rank was ranked the second-lowest received for physical harm—including chronic and acute harms—in a study commissioned by the House of Commons’ Science and Technology Committee, for which doctors, psychiatrists and epidemiologists assessed the physical harms, dependence and social harms of 20 drugs.

The drug tends to be stigmatized for its branding as “date-rape drugs” and its steep “dose-response curve”—meaning that redosing yields exponentially more intense effects and can lead to passing out. Overdoses can be prevented through harm reduction strategies, like not mixing with other drugs, accurately dosing with a milliliter syringe, and starting and going slow.

The “majority” of the ACMD’s Technical Committee recommended reclassifying GHB—and related substances GBL and 1,4 butanediol (1,4-BD)—from Class C to Class B of the UK’s drug schedule, where it would join other chemsex drugs like mephedrone and ketamine. The maximum penalty for possession would increase from two years in prison to five. The change wouldn’t alter the 14-year maximum sentence for suppliers and producers.

A Minority Dissents

The Technical Committee’s decision was taken despite a minority warning that the reclassification could uniquely criminalize queer and trans people—all while bucking public health research and potentially hurting the very people the change purports to protect

Those against the reclassification noted, the report summarizes, the “unintended impacts of reclassification on those using these compounds—particularly those from the LGBT community and those using these compounds in the Chemsex context specifically. These already vulnerable groups could be disproportionately impacted by any changes to the criminal justice system.”

The change may even harm survivors of sexual violence facilitated by GHB-RS.

They also warned that more punishment is not the key to reducing harms. There is a “lack of evidence to suggest that reclassification alone would be effective in reducing the harms associated with these compounds,” the report notes. “Overwhelmingly, public health experts, like from the World Health Organization, and international governing bodies, like the United Nations, assert punitive laws, like drug criminalization statutes, have ‘been proven to have negative health outcomes and that counter established public health evidence.'”

The change may even harm survivors of sexual violence facilitated by GHB-RS. “Higher offences applicable to the possession of these compounds,” the report states, “could deter recreational users who fell victim to a drug facilitated sexual assault from reporting their assault to the police.” UK queer and trans survivors of hate crimes already have bad experiences with cops; a 2019 survey found that almost half (45 percent) of those reporting such violence “were unsatisfied with how their report was handled.” Commons reasons survivors didn’t report such incidents to police were that “‘it would not be taken seriously enough’ and/or that ‘nothing would happen or change’.”

The Evidence Around GHB-Related Harms

The Technical Committee majority justified its decision based on “a significant body of new evidence of the harms of these compounds emerging since the ACMD’s last review of their classification, particularly in terms of the associated levels of drug-related death and their ‘weaponization’ (use to facilitate robbery and sexual assault).”

The epidemiological study of GHB-RS harms is sparse in comparison to the public health monitoring of other drugs. Of the data that do exist, GHB-RS harms appear to be concentrated in urban queer scenes.

Compared to deaths related to other drugs, reported GHB-RS fatalities are uncommon.

Emergency department cases of GHB-RS-related health emergencies seem to be mostly presenting in London hospitals, particularly those located near popular LGBTQ nightlife scenes. Between autumn 2013 and 2014, two such hospitals, Guy’s and St Thomas’s, saw more GHB/GBL overdoses (293) than they did for heroin (111) and cocaine (171) combined.

That’s alarming—but it can’t be presumed to be the case across the UK. In fact, the ACMD report noted that a hospital that saw zero GHB/GBL overdoses in that year-long period “may be more representative of the picture nationally,” though adding that “this is difficult to determine without data from other UK hospitals being included.”

Compared to deaths related to other drugs, reported GHB-RS fatalities are uncommon. That doesn’t mean more aren’t occurring; the chemical is rapidly metabolized by and cleared from the body, posing challenges for postmortem detection.

The ACDM report presents a spotty statistical picture. Between 1995 and 2012, researchers recorded 159 cases where GHB was listed to have caused death across England and Wales—or 0.5 percent of all drug-related deaths in that 17-year period, according to the ACMD report. More recent numbers from London, a GHB-RS hotspot, between 2011 and 2015 show a slightly higher fraction of 0.92 percent (61 deaths out of 6,633). But the figures aren’t even comparable: The London numbers capture all deaths where “GHB was present in some form,” as the ACMD explains.

The “strong new evidence of significant criminal harm” is, in fact, slim.

On the other hand, the “strong new evidence of significant criminal harm” from GHB-RS that the ACMD describes is, in fact, slim. For alleged GHB-RS-facilitated sexual assaults, the report cites a single case: that of Reynhard Sinaga, who was convicted of assaulting 48 queer men. For murders allegedly associated with GHB-RS, again the report only points to two high-profile cases: those of Stephen Port and Gerald Matovu. All three cases have been the subject of sensationalized news media accounts.

The tactic of invoking a few notorious cases is straight from the United States’ playbook for criminalizing GHB-RS. In the 1990s, lawmakers framed their political battle to criminalize GHB-RS as a so-called date-rape drug” around the death of a teenage girl, Hillory Farias, who was framed as a sexual assault victim (despite no indication of such violence) and likely did not even take the drug, much less die from it.

The ACMD’s call to up penalties is also, plainly, pro-cop—amid growing calls by the UK public to defund the police. The report authors explain that the reclassification would allow for “providing law enforcement agencies with additional tools to tackle offences associated with these compounds.” The UK has seen similar Uprisings against police terror and calls for police defunding or abolition to those that have radically shaped 2020 in the United States.

“Unintended Consequences”

The Technical Committee overall identified “unintended consequences” of its recommendation. Similar to how some people who once used prescription opioids then shifted to unregulated fentanyl-adulterated heroin, current-GHB-RS users, the Committee warns, may “shift to increased use of GHV/GVL,” two GHB-related that are not controlled.

The tendency for UK residents to adopt previously little-used substances in the wake of supply-side crackdowns has precedent. After GHB was deemed a Class C drug in 2003—right around when the US was criminalizing it—GBL and 1,4-BD seemed to increasingly be used, attracting the ACMD’s attention and resulting in those substances’ Class C classification in 2009.

The Technical Committee also noted that the reclassification “may force current GHB users to withdraw from the drug in an uncontrolled way with consequent impacts on their physical and mental health.” GHB-RS withdrawal can have serious health consequences, like insomnia, anxiety, tremors, sweating, increased heart rate and blood pressure, and psychosis.

The report additionally called for expanding data collection and education on, as well as toxicological testing and behavioral health services for, GHB-RS use.

Image adapted from a 2006 Acon educational guide via Archives of Sexuality and Gender

The post UK Drug Council Knows GHB Crackdown Targets Queer People, Recommends It Anyway appeared first on Filter.

Over the past two decades, 74 Australians died of GHB-related causes, as recorded by coroners. Most of these deaths (79 percent) were from drug toxicity, while others were related to trauma from motor vehicle crashes and suicide. Researchers at the National Drug and Alcohol Research Centre in Sydney found that many of them could potentially have been stopped through first aid—or avoided by the person sticking to one drug, instead of mixing G, as it’s colloquially known, with other substances.

Many of the deaths (30 percent), were caused by the inhalation of vomit. For one of the study’s authors, this highlights the importance of bystanders’ interventions and the provision of emergency medical attention.

“Many of the deaths involving inhaling vomit (aspiration) could possibly have been avoided by placing the person in a recovery position,” said psychologist Shane Darke in a press release. “Vomiting and aspiration are common with GHB overdose. The maintenance of adequate respiration, clearing the airway, and calling an ambulance are crucial.”

Bystanders, he recommends, should take action when they “see anyone with key signs of overdose like vomiting, shallow breathing, loud snoring, or have passed out.” This important peer intervention could be limited by bans on GHB in US-American and European clubs, some harm reductionists have have warned. In the Australian cases reviewed by Darke, though, most (84 percent) occurred in a home environment.

Almost all of the cases (92 percent) involved use of G in combination with at least one other drug—a practice Darke described as being “incredibly dangerous.” It is well established that mixing drugs is the “norm, not the exception” of use, as Harm Reduction Coalition’s Dr. Kim Sue once characterized it to Filter, and is playing a major role in the opioid-involved overdose crisis in North America.

In the Australian cases, the most common substances mixed with G were psychostimulants (64 percent), like methamphetamine; “hypnosedatives” (28 percent), like ketamine; and alcohol (20 percent). Meth can boost wakefulness, thereby offsetting the sleepiness caused by G. A person using both may then underestimate their level of intoxication and take an additional dose they’d otherwise not. “Downers” such as ketamine and alcohol themselves slow down breathing, and mixing them with G can fatally exacerbate that.

Darke rejects any benign characterizations of G. “The idea that this is some type of safe party drug is completely wrong,” he said.

But while G’s harms can be deadly, it is not necessarily exceptional. In fact, G was considered to be far less dangerous than comparatively less-stigmatized drugs like alcohol and cannabis and other popular club drugs, like cocaine and ketamine, by the parliament of the United Kingdom in 2006.

GHB-related fatalities are not destined. How a person uses and how their peers respond are what can determine fatal outcomes—not the mere fact of taking the drug itself.

Photograph of an eyedropper by Dean DiSalvo via Flickr/Creative Commons

The post Study: Fatal GHB Overdoses Could Easily Be Prevented appeared first on Filter.

GHB and GBL are central nervous system depressants, like alcohol, and produce an alcohol-like intoxication. GHB is a chemical that occurs naturally in the human brain, while GBL is an industrial chemical that can be manually or metabolically converted into GHB. In the US, GHB tends to be more common, while GBL is bigger in Europe. G, as both chemicals are colloquially known, is usually dissolved in water, sold as a clear liquid and consumed orally.

I wasn’t able to sip it slowly like I usually do. Neither was my friend. That’s because we were at a popular New York City queer rave in mid-January called Unter, which has a harsh anti-G policy. A sign with a big slashed “GHB” was taped by the coat check, commanding partygoers to “KEEP GHB+GBL OUT!” and claiming that “GHB IS ACTIVELY HARMING THE GREATER DANCE MUSIC COMMUNITIES.”

Data on G-related harms among New Yorkers is scarce. The New York City Department of Health and Mental Hygiene was not able to comment by the time of publication. But in London, fatal G overdoses and G-involved sexual assaults have been shown to be widespread. More than a quarter of mostly-British gay men reported that they knew someone who has died from a G overdose, and the same proportion said that they had been subjected to sexual assault while using G, found BuzzFeed News UK.

Wanting to prevent G-related harms is admirable. Unfortunately, I’m not sure that’s what Unter’s policy is doing.

I rushed my dose in an unlit stall because I wanted to stay at the party. Trans girls like myself and my friend get in for free, and the music is good. I didn’t want to face the punitive consequence the sign promised: “POSSESSION OR USE OF GHB+GBL @ UNTER WILL RESULT IN BEING BANNED.” The last word was extra-big, just in case we didn’t get the message.

My friend stepped out of the stall with a big grin on her face. “How much did you do?” I asked, curious. In the past, I had measured her dose for her. 

“Um, two milliters I think,” she said. “I’m not quite sure.”

When using G, knowing your exact dose is key to having a good time. Half a milliliter too much often seems to be the difference between a warm fuzzy feeling, akin to alcohol or molly, and the deathly slow breathing of an overdose. 

Thirty minutes later, when the G hit, my friend began to feel nauseous. “I think I need to sit down.”

In times past, I shared tips and tricks for safer G use with my friend: First shake the dropper, since G tends to otherwise settle at the bottom, making final doses extra-potent; draw up an exact amount—probably, for my friend at least, one or 1.5 milliliters; only re-dose after two hours, with half the amount of the previous dose; never mix with alcohol or ketamine. 

Maybe some of that information slipped her mind. After all, we just wanted to get in and out of that bathroom undetected.

Thirty minutes later, when the G hit, my friend began to feel nauseous. “I think I need to sit down,” she told me.

She eventually vomited in the trash can on the side of the dance floor. I looked around to see if anyone had noticed. I went to get her water. They were only selling it; nothing was free.

The nausea luckily ended up being the full extent of the excessive dosing’s harm—but it could have ended much worse.

The Harms Posed by G Bans

It’s unclear how many people—if any—have been barred from Unter and its new sister party, Large Marge, as a result of the events’ anti-G policy. But in my experience, the policy doesn’t stop use.

Instead, it inspires the fear of being humiliated and kicked out, driving riskier rushed use of a drug that requires precise dosing. Because my friend and I were anxious about being caught, we dosed separately, not consulting one another through the stall door out of concern that someone would overhear us. We didn’t even think to text about it because we just wanted to get the dosing over with.

The policy could also impact how people respond when something does go wrong.

“Under a banned-for-life threat, you are less likely to call an ambulance for your friend or to alert the security team. We see that people try to hide the situation and deal with it themselves in what can be cases of life or death,” Inês Macedo and Mariana Cunha of Kosmicare, a Portugese harm reduction organization, told Filter. “If we look at the case-reports on GBL/GHB deaths, we see that almost all happened when mixing G with other drugs or while sleeping-it-out, both very common responses to avoid tipping off the organizers for the use of GHB.”

“The dominant attitude of rave organizers regarding GBL/GHB use is of prohibitionism.”

The policy does not seem to be having its intended effect. Anecdotally, other attendees are still using the sedative. At Large Marge, held on January 18, one raver chatted openly with me about how he and his friends were currently “G-ing out.” So were my friends.

The same seems to go for other parties and contexts. “If I like G and I go to a sauna, I will find a way,” London-based chemsex harm reductionist Ignacio Labayen De Inza told me of establishments with strict “No G” policies. “Two or three years ago they would check, but you could see people passing out.” 

Seva Granik, the organizer of Unter and Large Marge, declined Filter‘s request for comment for this story. But the origin of Unter’s policy seems rooted in legacy queer rave culture.

“In Berlin GHB is a fucking nono and they kick you out if you get caught with it or caught overdosing,” wrote one Reddit user in 2018.

“I had heard that a few years ago someone had died right in the club from mixing G and alcohol. It seems they assume people with G either can’t use it sensibly and will fuck themselves up or they will use it nefariously and spike somebody’s drink with it (which happens occasionally I think),” posted a different Reddit user about Berghain, the world’s most famous techno club. 

The legendary club has allegedly responded to club-goers intoxicated on G with violence, a Medium writer claimed in 2018. 

Anti-GHB sentiment has been alive and well for some time in Western Europe. A 2009 London party warned, “keep GHB & GBL out of our clubs.” A 2010 Berlin event commanded, “DO NOT GIVE GHB !! take care of yourself, your friends and others,” according to Google Translate. Another Berlin party stated in 2017, “NO G.H.B.”

“The dominant attitude of rave organizers regarding GBL/GHB use is of prohibitionism, and Portugal is following this general tendency,” said Macedo and Kunha. “In Lisbon, one of the most well-known clubs has specific materials advising against G usage since 2018, and other gay/queer bars, saunas and venues are also adopting a zero-tolerance policy. Ravers describe harsh practices from staff in situations involving GBL/GHB, with a visible stigma and marginalization of its users, even in private settings.”

Unter’s GHB/GBL policy seemed to first be introduced in October 2018 during a party featuring two Berghain residents. It reads: “Anyone seen in possession, using, or aiding in use of GBL or GHB, a potentially deadly chemical, will be swiftly escorted out, and henceforth barred for life from all future Unter events.”

Exceptionalism and Distortion

Unter’s policy makes no mention of any other substance. And it seems that such policies, by exceptionalizing G, distort perceptions of its harms.

In 2006, GHB/GBL was considered by the UK parliament to be far less dangerous than most other common party drugs, including cocaine, alcohol, ketamine, benzos, amphetamine, cannabis and LSD. GHB received the second lowest ranking of physical harm—including chronic and acute harms—in a study commissioned by the House of Commons’ Science and Technology Committee, for which doctors, psychiatrists and epidemiologists assessed the physical harms, dependence and social harms of 20 drugs.

And while GHB/GBL is singled out, other drugs linked with deaths in Berlin clubs are left unmentioned in their policies. In just one night at Berghain, three people reportedly died from pills sold as ecstasy, two sources claimed in 2019. In 2017, a US-American tourist was confirmed to have died at the club after taking another such pill.

The lower number of bans in the US could be due to the relative lack of media coverage here.

The scale of G bans at raves in the US seems far smaller than in Europe. But New York’s Unter and Large Marge are not the only examples. One 2018 party in San Francisco announced: “ZERO TOLERANCE FOR GHB / SECURITY WILL BE CHECKING FOR IT.” In 2017, a Los Angeles party informed potential partiers: “We are sick of calling ambulances, so we’ll be searching for GHB at the door” and “If we have to remove you from the event for using GHB, you, and everyone in your crew, will be blacklisted from all future events. Handle your shit,” according to a Vice report.

The lower number of bans in the US could be due to the relative lack of media coverage here, in contrast to the major smears and demonizations peddled by British media. In the UK, G has garnered a killer public reputation following its use by multiple serial rapists and murderers as a “date rape” drug.

Labayen De Inza understands why businesses would have such prohibitive policies. “When it’s G, the tolerance is less because if someone dies on my premise, I can lose my license. I don’t think it’s about punishment, and more about protecting themselves.”

Macedo and Cunha also assume this rationale, but still staunchly oppose it. “We are aware of the negative impact that GBL/GHB use has on clubs such as heavy fines and even the risk of being shut down, but we do not believe in prohibitionist attitude as a viable solution,” they said. “We believe that advocating drug prohibition makes club owners and party-organizers feel better as [they] think they are ‘doing something’ about the situation, dismissing them from any responsibility on deaths or other serious consequences.” 

Extending Harm Reduction to G

Some space is being made for harm reduction in queer nightlife. On January 20 in Lisbon, Kosmicare, in collaboration with two queer rave collectives, “mina” and “suspension,” facilitated a pre-party discussion about G, described by suspension as “a drug that is causing stir among the communities of queer ravers due to its easily overdosed nature of consumptions—often mentioned as “collapse”—knit-tight with sex practices and yet shrouded in myths and confusion.” 

“We would like rave organizers to address GHB use under harm reduction principles eventually in collaboration with specialized teams, working together in convenient campaigns that take into account recent literature, scientific evidence, good practice principles and users’ reports on their experiences,” said Macedo and Cunha.

They recommend that party organizers “communicate potential harm, risks and pleasures in a clear, direct and non-moral way.” Key communications could address what to do if someone overdoses and advise users to “avoid mixing G with alcohol, as this greatly increases the risk of going under/overdosing,” they said. Distributing dosing syringes and providing drug-checking services would also be helpful.

Some parties and clubs are combining harm reduction and prohibition-leaning messaging. In New York City, queer party collective Discakes promoted G harm reduction in anticipation of their New Year’s Eve party. They posted DanceSafe educational materials on Instagram about dosing, timing and first aid.

But they also added the caption, “Due to safety concerns about over doses, we don’t recommend ghb usage at our New Year’s Eve party”—the only prohibitory warning given for any drug, and not included with the harm reduction education they posted about meth and cocaine. 

 

View this post on Instagram

 

Due to safety concerns about over doses, we don’t recommend ghb usage at our New Year’s Eve party. Shoutout @dancesafe_ for these amazing harm reduction tips They will tabling on NYE giving out free fentanyl testing strips, narcan and narcan training, free condoms, and helpful non judgmental non biased harm reduction tips. Thank you @dancesafe_ we love you so much, keeping ravers safe and educated

A post shared by DisCakes (@discakesnyc) on Dec 29, 2019 at 4:54pm PST

Even in European clubs with G bans, some have reportedly set aside rooms for party-goers who have “gone under,” or overdosed on G. “If someone isn’t fully aware or consciousness, and I work in a club, they tend to have a medical room and they keep them there. And when he’s feeling better they tell him to go,” said Labayen De Inza. For him, this is a step in the right direction; he believes, “People who use drugs always find a way.”

“The most important thing is information. It’s not just about how this drug works. It’s about how people work.”

Labayen De Inza has seen the dark side of bans. “Many years ago, around [2009], I heard that they put a man in the street and he died. At that point there was little information.” Cases like that form the basis for the practices and education that he thinks party organizers should adopt. 

“The most important thing is information,” he emphasized. “It’s not just about how this drug works. It’s about how people work. Not everyone’s going to be nice. Sometimes they have agendas. You have to take responsibility for your safety.” 

In January GCN, an independent Irish LGBTQ publication, published a helpful safer use guide.

Luke Howard, a DJ who once worked at London Friend’s Antidote, an LGBTQ addiction resource program, agrees with the harm reduction sentiment. “It’s concerning for me to hear these anecdotal stories about G overdoses in New York or Berlin, because I feel if people don’t know what advice to give or how to treat people then we will see more deaths and more clubs close down,” he told Vice in 2017. “But what needs to happen is a positive response. We shouldn’t marginalize or stigmatize people. Turning them into ‘unwanted people’ doesn’t solve the problem.”

Photograph of the line outside of Berghain by Michael Mayer via Flickr/Creative Commons

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