How to fight against GHB?

2023-08-11 08:05:41

In March, young women publicly denounced involuntary GHB intoxications of which they had been victims in Montreal. A few months later, the Minister of Public Security François Bonnardel launched an action plan comprising 11 measures to fight against the scourge. Stakeholders surveyed by The duty believe that Quebec could go even further.

Through his action plan, the Minister wishes in particular to “define and make known the trajectory of detection and reporting” for presumed victims who have not suffered sexual assault and who wish to undergo screening. In Quebec, at present, the use of a GHB detection test in people who have not been sexually assaulted remains marginal (see text in one).

The Minister also plans to “raise the federal government’s awareness of the importance of setting up an approval mechanism” for rapid tests for the detection of GHB, the reliability of which is disputed.

The minister declined our interview request. In a statement sent by email, its press secretary, Roxanne Bourque, writes that these 11 measures will “help mobilize society to counter acts of chemical submission and to take care of the victims”.

The co-spokesperson for Québec solidaire, Manon Massé, who co-signed an open letter on the subject in March, believes that the accessibility of tests must be at the heart of the government’s strategy to fight against GHB. “I call on the government to put the necessary energy into developing a test accessible throughout Quebec, and thus allow intoxicated women to have proof to be taken seriously by the police”, she underlines in interview at Duty.

In April, Minister Bonnardel announced the Check your glass campaign. The pilot project, carried out in partnership with the Service de police de la Ville de Montréal and Éduc’alcool, consists of distributing glass protectors in Montreal bars in order to prevent ill-intentioned spirits from pouring drugs into them. M^me Massé had condemned the name, which in his view put “all the responsibility on the victims”.

Other possible measures

Stakeholders surveyed by The duty have different views on the best ways to deal with unintentional GHB poisoning.

M^me Massé first insists on the accessibility of the tests, but also on the training of police forces and bar staff. “Another thing that the government can do is the whole issue of training, so that employees are able to support [les victimes]. »

Father Dominic Vézina, whose daughter Aïcha believes she was drugged with GHB in 2019, would go even further. “Ultimately, if you want to make sure that there is no drug use in bars, there is surely a way to empty people’s pockets. What is complexity? He denounces the fact that we “often search the bags of the girls, but the guys, we don’t ask them to empty their pockets”.

In the end, if you want to make sure that there is no drug consumption in bars, there is surely a way to empty people’s pockets.

His daughter Aïcha also believes that bar managers have a role to play. “Offering us glass covers would be the basis,” she says.

But what if GHB poisonings were less common than the shocking denunciations in the media and on social networks suggest? “There is like a popular belief a little bit, I would say, which overestimates the prevalence of GHB as a drug,” says biochemist at the Center de toxicologie du Québec Nicolas Caron.

He believes that the best practice when a person is involuntarily poisoned is to carry out a “complete toxicological assessment” in a hospital centre. “The person who is intoxicated is the one who has the least information about what happened,” he maintains.

Aïcha Gascon-Vézina is more vigilant than ever. Especially since three weeks before experiencing a suspected GHB intoxication herself, she witnessed a similar scene when she saw her friend collapse on the dance floor of a nightclub on Sainte-Catherine Street. . However, she had consumed little alcohol.

“I think I’m going to rediscover the pleasure of going out to bars,” says the young woman. But always with more vigilance. »