RAVE DEATHS SPARK ECSTASY DEBATE

Spanish Pressure Groups Demand Action To Educate Clubbers On Drug Risks

The deaths of two young people after taking ecstasy at a mass rave in
Malaga have set off a national debate about drugs, with calls for their
complete legalisation and a campaign to educate young Spaniards about their
dangers.

In Spain it is not illegal to consume drugs of any kind in private, but
people can be fined for consumption in public and trafficking carries a
prison sentence. Drug use is slightly lower than in Britain.

But the government in Madrid has not adopted an information strategy like
the 'safer clubbing' campaign launched this month in the UK. At the rave
which produced last weekend's deaths, clubbers said taps were blocked,
water was on sale at almost UKP2 a bottle and doors were locked to prevent
people going outside to buy cheaper drink.

The young men who died, Ivan Garcia, 19, and Joaquin Barragan, 20, were
among as many as 15,000 people crammed into a venue with a capacity of
8,500. Two others were taken to hospital, while 20 others were treated by
Red Cross workers at the scene.

A 24-year-old was in intensive care on Thursday after taking a tablet
bought at the rave, while officials in Seville reported the death of a
19-year-old girl two weeks ago again after taking ecstasy. A fourth person,
from the Andaluz province of Jaen, was reported to have died earlier in the
year from the drug.

Experts say that tablets sold at the rave seem to have contained a high
dose of MDMA, suggesting that the victims died from an overdose rather than
from contaminated tablets.

The danger of ecstasy is that users become overheated and dehydrated;
Garcia's heart-rate rose to 205 beats per minute, three times the norm,
before he died on Saturday night, while Barragan succumbed to kidney
failure on Monday, after 40 hours in intensive care.

Over the past decade, Spain has logged at least 10 and possibly as many as
25 deaths linked to ecstasy use. These latest casualties, though, 'have
captured the attention of the public and created alarm over ecstasy', said
Javier Rouvira of Energy Control, an organisation that analyses ecstasy
tablets for clubbers.

He added: 'In Spain there is still no policy of showing clubs how to
protect their clientele.' Locking the doors so that people could not buy
cheaper alcohol outside was common practice.

He believed that contamination was no longer the main risk to clubbers:
'The black market has cleaned up pills, but the doses still vary wildly,'
he explained. His organisation has found that pills can contain anywhere
from 14mg of ecstasy to 140mg, which means users can easily overdose.

'Until drugs are legalised, deaths by overdose will multiply. Until we have
more information about this drug, the myths surrounding it will be
maintained,' wrote the daily El Pais last week.

According to Javier Hernandez of the National Plan for Control of Drugs,
'Spain's problems are mostly with alcohol and synthetic drugs - heroin use
has fallen dramatically. Crack does not exist here, and cocaine use is stable.'

Meanwhile, the bereaved parents raged against the authorities. 'They killed
him, they tore his insides out,' said Antonio Barragan, father of Joaquin.
He and the Garcia family are considering legal action, but it is not clear
who is responsible for the rave: the municipal authorities, which lent out
the sports centre gratis to a radio programme on a channel owned by the
Andalusia regional government, or the radio-show presenter, whose company
apparently organised the party.

A case brought by the family of a girl who died last year in Cadiz after
taking ecstasy was dismissed for lack of evidence against any specific person.

Rouvira says that ecstasy consumption has stayed stable in Spain over the
past few years. He is also concerned by the less dramatic, non-fatal
side-effects of the drug, pointing out that around 900 people visited
casualty units in Catalonia last year because of psychiatric problems
associated with ecstasy, mostly anxiety attacks.

The head of the US Drug Enforcement Administration, Asa Hutchinson, told
delegates at an international anti-drug conference in Bolivia last week
that use of ecstasy was growing because of a misconception among the young
that the drug is harmless.

'I wonder how many long-term cocaine addictions were created in the 1970s
for lack of correct information,' he said. 'And I wonder how many problems
we will have with ecstasy and other drugs consumed in discotheques and
clubs for the same reason.'