SAFETY PLAN PUT FORWARD FOR NIGHTCLUB DRUG USERS

The Government is so concerned at the number of nightclubbers dying from
ecstasy and other illegal substances that it will tell club owners and
licensing authorities today to provide safe facilities for drug users.

A Home Office official said the instruction to venues to provide special
measures aimed at catering for clubbers under the influence of illegal
drugs was an acknowledgement that a significant section of British society
viewed drug-taking as "an integral part of their night out".

Clubs will be advised to ensure adequate supplies of free water to prevent
drug users from dehydrating and to provide good ventilation and areas where
clubbers can cool down to guard against overheating. Suggestions will also
be made to regulate the beat of the music to reduce the risk of drug users
suffering hyperthermia on the dancefloor.

Clubs will also be told that they ought to provide a separate treatment
room so that clubbers who are suffering from the negative effects can
recover in a calm and cool environment. Staff should be trained in first
aid so that they can treat customers who have become intoxicated with drugs
or alcohol, according to the Home Office's guidelines, called Safer Clubbing.

Publication of the guidelines follows a claim by the National Criminal
Intelligence Service that 100 million ecstasy pills are consumed in Britain
a year. The number of deaths linked to ecstasy rose from eight in 1993 to
36 in 2000. Cocaine, which the Government believes is being increasingly
used as a club drug, was linked to 90 deaths in 2000.

A Home Office spokesman said: "Our research has shown that drug use (among
the whole population) has stabilised but that, as a group, clubbers are
taking more drugs than previous generations, far heavier quantities and a
mixture of drugs ... Unfortunately there are many young people who see
taking drugs as an integral part of their night out."

The spokesman said the guide was designed to help avoid "exacerbating"
health risks faced by drug-using clubbers. He said "environmental factors"
often played a key part in drug-related deaths, many of which were
avoidable. "The guide clearly identifies that a 'Just Say No' campaign to
clubbers is likely to be ineffective because they are already confirmed
drug users," he said.

The launch of the report today by the Home Office minister Robert Ainsworth
comes amid claims that drugs are so widely available in Britain that demand
is at "saturation point".

Danny Kushlick, director of drugs think-tank Transform, said: "Drug use has
stabilised, not because the Government is doing a great job, but because
there will always be a level of demand in any population and that is now
being met. Recreational drug users can now access drugs whenever they want."

Viv Craske, the senior editor of the dance music magazine Mixmag, which
commissioned research last month that found that 98 per cent of its readers
used ecstasy, said the price of the drug had fallen from UKP9 to UKP4 a
pill in the last three years.

He said anecdotal evidence suggested ecstasy was increasingly being
produced in illicit laboratories in Britain rather than imported from
Holland, the traditional source of supply for the British market.
Availability was so widespread that the British laboratories were
responding to demand for better quality pills with a more consistent strength.

Mr Craske criticised plans in the new Home Office guide to step up searches
for drugs at the doors to nightclubs. He said clubbers would be forced to
"double drop" pills before arriving at clubs, increasing the risks to their
health.

But Harry Shapiro of the drugs charity Drugscope said there had been a
spate of ecstasy-related deaths recently and that younger users needed to
be aware of the dangers.