New non-profit goals to cut back overdoses at US music festivals

Based on the Facilities for Illness Management and Prevention (CDC), over 150 people in the US die from fentanyl-related overdoses every day.

This Must Be The Place, a non-profit that distributes free Naloxone, a drugs that quickly reverses opioid overdose, is working to cut back fentanyl-related deaths at music festivals. The organisation, which began earlier this yr is constructed on the concept drug remedy, not punishment and judgement, is the way in which ahead.

Co-founders Ingela Travers-Hayward and William Perry spoke with NME concerning the significance of Naloxone in treating overdoses, why they began their non-profit, and the way they hope to proceed breaking the stigmas round drug use and remedy.

• READ MORE: Why drugs testing at festivals is an excellent – and well overdue – idea

This Should Be The Place determined to distribute Narcan (a model of Naloxone) kits at music festivals as a result of they needed to get them into the arms of people that might not even understand they wanted them. So, this yr, they began establishing cubicles at occasions the place attendees may choose up kits and obtain free coaching on the right way to use the product. For the non-profit founders, their need to assist competition attendees comes from their private expertise.

Travers-Hayward acquired to know music competition tradition as a journalist for MTV Information Canada. Perry, nevertheless, had a extra “nefarious” expertise with music festivals, recalling how he and his mates would sneak into occasions and see the place the day and medicines would take them from there. “We might celebration actually exhausting going to this competition, that competition, that was our life-style,” Perry informed NME. “Doing that led me into a complete lot of substance use issues.”

As a denizen of the Midwestern US, identified for its carceral, punitive policies towards drug use, Perry’s substance use additionally led to a decade in jail. Whereas there, he would hear tales about mates he used to go to festivals with dying of fentanyl overdoses. Now, as a sober restoration counsellor, he needed to do what the federal government at massive wasn’t: present training, sources, and in some instances remedy for these affected by drug abuse.

That need to offer training and sources elevated over the pandemic lockdown. As Perry and Travers-Hayward had been holed up of their home in Columbus, Ohio, they seen a distressing sample in most of the information tales they learn. “There have been quite a lot of information tales about how folks had been doing cocaine and dying, and doing molly and dying,” Travers-Hayward informed us. Then as lockdown ended and live shows and festivals grew to become the norm once more, they frightened this pattern would proceed at a good faster tempo.

“When folks got here out of their homes this yr, we knew they had been going to celebration and make up for misplaced time and go to music occasions they couldn’t go to throughout lockdown,” Perry stated. “These are simply the areas we all know the right way to exist in. So we had been like, ‘Let’s attempt to get forward of it. As an alternative of there being this actually unhealthy occasion that occurs, let’s be on website and supply folks with Narcan.’”

Travers-Hayward and Perry utilized for 501(c)(3) standing, and, after a couple of logistical complications, This Should Be the Place grew to become an official non-profit group. Subsequent, they began pitching festivals throughout the US, asking if they may distribute free Narcan and arrange their very own sales space. They had been informed “no” way over “sure,” however, as soon as they acquired their first greenlight from a serious competition, every thing fell into place.

The primary competition the group labored at was Maple Home Fest in Pittsburgh in Could. Though it was a one-day competition, it nonetheless demanded loads of vitality, gasoline, and time. “I distinctly keep in mind the subsequent morning, we awoke, and thought, ‘Oh my god, I’m extra exhausted than ever. How within the hell are we going to tug off Bonnaroo,” Travers-Hayward stated.

After distributing Narcan at Maple Home Fest, they did it once more on the two-day competition, WonderRoad in Indianapolis in June. It ended on a Sunday, and Perry and Travers-Hayward needed to execute a fast turnaround to get to their subsequent competition on Thursday. They departed Indianapolis for Columbus by automobile, loaded up their automobile with as many Naloxone kits as potential, and drove straight to Manchester, Tennessee, for the four-day-long Bonnaroo Music and Artwork Pageant.

Though the expertise was bodily draining, the duo was happy to see that regardless of offering 1000’s of Narcan kits at Bonnaroo (even handing one to Machine Gun Kelly), they didn’t see a single a kind of kits littered on the competition grounds.

“Folks had been taking it critically, not simply because it was one thing that was being handed out, however as a result of they had been taking it with which means,” Perry stated. “If we had seen it on the bottom, it might be heartbreaking, however everybody was taking these items or placing it someplace secure and taking it house with them.”

Nonetheless, This Should Be the Place is combating the stigma surrounding drug remedy. Travers-Hayward stated that that they had many “tough conversations” with occasion promoters. Perry stated that for each “sure,” they acquired at festivals like Burning Man, they acquired “20 nos” in flip.

“There are nonetheless very archaic views about these items on the market,” Travers-Hayward stated. “However the actuality is that Naloxone will not be going to harm you. I may shove one up my nostril proper now, and it’s not going to make a distinction, besides I’m going to have the shitty feeling of water up my nostril.”

Additionally they needed to persuade promoters and business employees that their group was not “opening a secure injection website.” Somewhat, “you’re defending your followers [and] for as soon as getting out in entrance of one thing earlier than one thing unhealthy occurs,” Perry stated.

All through the 9 festivals that This Should Be the Place labored over the summer time, they’ve handed out a complete of 10,887 free Naloxone kits. Though they’ve offered kits for 1000’s of individuals, they nonetheless keep in mind particular person tales that resonated with them. A type of tales got here from a younger girl who took a Narcan package at Seattle’s Capitol Hill Block Get together competition in August.

“She texted us that she took Narcan from us, though she hardly ever makes use of medication, and ended up utilizing it on a stranger inside 24 hours of us giving it to her,” Travers-Hayward stated. “Each of her dad and mom messaged us and stated, ‘You allowed us to have a dialogue with our child about these items.’ They’d this actually significant dialog about what it means to assist a stranger.”

Requested about their future hopes, This Should Be The Place informed NME they need to “exit of enterprise.” Though neither of them makes a single cent doing this work, they hope in the future, there gained’t be a necessity for them to distribute Naloxone at festivals within the first place.

“Anybody who has energy to do one thing ought to be doing one thing,” Perry stated. “This summer time was extremely profitable. Due to that, our aim is to be in 25 cities subsequent yr and handy out 20,000 kits and ensure persons are stored secure. We need to do what music has at all times finished, which is be on the leading edge, be a part of social change, and struggle for a trigger.”

In the meantime within the UK, Reading & Leeds Festival issued a warning earlier this yr about using medication at their 2022 festivals, noting that “ecstasy deaths seem like rising yr on yr”. The warning adopted organisers of Boardmasters warning attendees of dangerously high-strength MDMA that was found on-site at the festival.

One other latest warning was sounded after pills that were tested at Secret Garden Party 2022 were found to contain more than 2.5 times the typical amount of ecstasy.