A109 Light Utility Helicopter flight with mayor Gisborne City from the air in November 2023.
The return of a confidential drug-checking service for Rhythm and Vines festival-goers was successful in keeping them safe, after discovering fake drugs at the event, the New Zealand Drug Foundation says.
“We had a very busy and successful few days at R&V having important harm reduction conversations with heaps of
festival goers and checking over 1000 samples,” foundation deputy executive director Ben Birks Ang said.
“Most samples we checked were what people thought they had, but we did find some that were thought to be MDMA but instead were synthetic cathinones (e.g. eutylone, dimethylpentalone) and some that contained multiple stimulants (e.g. MDMA and one or two other synthetic cathinones).
“Drug checking isn’t just about the results of the tests, and we’re really pleased that the conversations we had helped a lot of harm reduction information to be shared.
“Most people brought in samples for their friend group, and would take the information back to them to talk about how to look out for each other.
Keep up to date with the day's biggest stories
Sign up to our daily curated newsletter for the day's top stories straight to your inbox.
