SGP becomes first UK fest to offer pill testing

In partnership with local authorities, last weekend's Secret Garden Party offered attendees the chance to test the content of their drugs without fear of recrimination

News By IQ | 25 July 2016

An aerial view of Secret Garden Party 2016, in Abbots Ripton, Cambridgeshire © Samantha Milligan

Secret Garden Party (SGP) last weekend became the first British music festival to offer on-site pill testing.

As part of a 10-minute health and safety session provided by drugs charity The Loop and supported by Cambridgeshire police, local public health authorities and festival promoter Secret Productions, festivalgoers were able to submit drugs for testing to establish their content before consumption. Around 200 people did so, discovering over 80 “substances of concern”, including extremely high-strength ecstasy, ‘ketamine’ that was actually an antimalarial and ammonium sulphate…

You've used your free article this month

Continue reading with a free account, or subscribe for unlimited access to all of our news, features and reports.

Subscribe Create a Free Account

Share this

MOST POPULAR

Related Content

The Charlatans, Kendal Calling 2016, Jody Hartley, The Loop pill testing

Pill testing: the cure for music’s drug problem?

As Hard Summer ends in tragedy for the second year running, we ask if police-backed drug testing – recently trialled at SGP and Kendal Calling – could be the way forward

News 3 August, 2016

Fans at Groovin the Moo 2017

As GTM mulls legality, researcher says pill testing could save lives

Ahead of a planned pill-testing trial at Groovin the Moo, an Australian academic has highlighted the ineffectiveness of zero-tolerance festival drug policy

News 10 April, 2018

Ecstasy pills, MDMA

Plan to take drugs at a festival? Do it in Europe…

As the European festival summer reaches its end, pill analysis reveals Europe's festivalgoers have access to the world's purest ecstasy: 67.1%, compared to 16% in Oz

News 22 August, 2017

Back to top