Music Festival Drug Test Kits Could Save Countless Lives [OPINION]

Every year, teenagers and young adults seem to be growing more and more infatuated with music festivals. It seems over the past decade the music festival industry has substantially grown in popularity. Many large-scale festivals such as Bonnaroo, Coachella, and Lollapalooza record attendance between 80,000 to 200,000 guests annually.

These festivals often span over a 3-4-day period and often include a camping option on-site. These festivals are amazing outlets for artists to showcase their work and for others to connect with one another via a mutual appreciation for music and the arts. However, with large music festivals comes drugs and widespread consumption of drugs.

Many people believe that music festivals should be stopped altogether because of the very common and widespread drug use that takes place, however most towns that host these festivals do not want them to stop since their economies are heavily stimulated every year by the events.

One of the larger issues that comes with drugs at festivals is the oblivious/dishonest people who sell said substances. For example, many popular substances used at festivals include LSD, MDMA (sometimes referred to as ‘ecstasy’), and Cocaine. While these drugs are obviously illegal in the United States, they are abundant at these festivals, and do not show signs of leaving anytime soon.

These drugs being at the festival are not the largest issue though. Many festival-safety sources (such as Dancesafe or The Bunk Police) will show that these drugs can be consumed somewhat safely if used responsibly by a consistently hydrated individual. Lately however, an issue larger than these substances themselves has come into light; fentanyl. Fentanyl is used medicinally to treat severe pain. Not only is it highly addictive, but it is also very cheap since it only requires an extremely small amount to feel effects.

Fentanyl has recently become an issue at festivals because many drug dealers will mix fentanyl powder in with other powdered drugs (like the drugs mentioned earlier) in order to turn a larger profit. Mixing fentanyl with stimulants is extremely dangerous and more than often proves to be fatal.

Just this past weekend at Electric Forest Music Festival in Rothbury, Michigan, multiple bags of powdered drugs tested positive for fentanyl. This is a very dangerous and quickly growing issue at festivals like this. Unless action is taken, hundreds, maybe even thousands of lives can be taken by this drug over the next few years.

The only way the public and festival attendees at Electric Forest were able to find out about fentanyl and avoid it at the festival was because of the aforementioned group called “The Bunk Police.” This is a group of people dedicated to getting dangerous drugs like fentanyl off the street and promote safe practices at shows and music festivals. They do this by bringing hundreds of drug test kits into festivals and offering to test people’s drugs for them for a small donation. They run multiple social media pages where they give people updates on what dangerous substances they find, what the individual that is distributing them looks like, and what the drugs/drug containers look like, so everyone can avoid them. They were even able to get a man distributing fentanyl disguised as another drug kicked out and arrested this past weekend.

The Bunk Police are actively saving people’s lives by providing a safe space for people to learn exactly what they are putting in their bodies and by promoting the safest possible festival experience. However, due to the RAVE act, which was passed in 2003, organizations like The Bunk Police are not allowed inside festivals or venues hosting shows.

This is because when the RAVE act was passed, Congress agreed that providing drug test kits at festivals only promotes the use of drugs and nothing else. As a result, festivals are forced to ban these test kits in order to avoid liability or any lawsuits that could possibly come from a drug death or overdose. So, because of this, The Bunk Police are forced to sneak in test kits to festivals in order to provide them to attendees. Many members of this organization have been kicked out of large festivals and some even detained, simply for trying to provide a safer experience for festival goers. While our government’s reservations about allowing drug-test kits into festivals are most definitely understandable, we need to collectively look at the bigger picture and realize the RAVE act will only hurt people by banning drug-test kits.

The fact of the matter is, as long as music festivals are a thing (and they show no sign of dying out), there will always be induvial consuming drugs. It is simply ignorant to say anything otherwise. So, while law enforcement cannot stop 100% of drug use at these events, it only makes sense to allow organizations like The Bunk Police to continue providing information, suggestions, and drug-test kits to attendees. If it cannot be completely stopped, the least we can do is make sure everything being consumed is totally safe. Almost every festival in Europe at this point has official tents and booths where attendees can test their substances, and European festivals have substantially lower overdose and death rates than U.S. festivals. Our nation needs to wake up and realize the epidemic that is fentanyl. We need to work together to keep this dangerous drug off the streets and out of our youth’s bloodstreams. The first step to doing this is to stop criminalizing organizations like The Bunk Police.