Forums › Drugs › Ecstasy & MDMA › MDMA risk levels may be gender specific
In the 90s/00s I remember a lot more young women reducing their use / moving away from the rave scene quicker than young men, and pointing out that heavy use caused them “womens problems”, although pills were not as strong then and cost more so gross overdoses were very uncommon.
The article also points out risks to all current users of accidentally taking much more MDMA than they wanted to..
Last night another 18 year old girl in NE England died after taking an ecstasy tablet. Her 19 year old male friend is arrested and remains in Police custody.
A teenager dies after taking drugs at a Newcastle nightclub – BBC News
Interesting. I’ve known some girls who’d take heavy doses and/or take it frequently but I think it doesn’t get processed as quickly in women although that could be bullshit. It is highly weight dependent as far as overdoses are concerned and men usually weigh a bit more so that should be taken into account.
The European researchers are suggesting some interaction with oestrogen that causes water retention, but what doesn’t immediately add up is the strong pills have been around 5 or so years in the UK, the original rave scene from late 1980s was very pro gender equality and open mindedness (in many ways more so than todays society) and not as if young women have suddenly just started taking drugs.
TBH I suspect there are interlinked issues – the first/normal doses young people are taking today being far higher than previously, valid harm reduction being overlooked/ignored due to declining reading skills/attention span, and gender/body image issues which unfortunately now infest even “alternative” scenes nowadays
The sort of folk who go clubbing nowadays (both girls and boys) in UK and Europe seem to be increasingly appearance and fashion conscious in comparison to the early 90s (where any fashion trends initially developed by accident rather than being embedded into the scene, that only happened by the late 90s/early 2000s).
If these ravers are underweight and/or perhaps still growing to start with then rising first doses are clearly asking for trouble.
I failed to say that I agree that it hits women harder and the girls I knew who’d take several points (100mg) or a handful of pills were veterans. If you’re new to the drug and take .2 or .3 you’re more likely to run into problems if you’re a girl.
PLUR or whatever the scene is now that follows EDM is such a douchy culture as far I can tell. I don’t rave anymore but it seemed better a decade ago comparatively, but I’m not objective.
One unusual aspect of the most recent Europe-wide panic was one of the NL victims in 2014 was a 41 year old female.
This is in the context that ravers in NL have access to harm reduction for 2 decades, slightly higher gender equality than UK (although perhaps not as much as DE) and also seem to keep partying well into their late youth, many only stopping/calming down at age 50 and some have far less shame in leading this lifestyle (Tiësto is after all in his late 40s now and from Breda!)
This led to articles on trouw.nl (a broadly Christian newspaper with a large female readership) and the womens section of De Telegraaf (possibly the same article by a freelancer slightly rehashed for both newspapers) discussing this issue and the use of party drugs by young women as a whole (with interviews with quite a few).
Opinions were as expected increasingly divided about this, and the responses highlighted a growing unease amongst female users that they could get fertility problems or if they are already parents risked leaving their kids motherless.
The science relating to female users (unsurprisingly) suggest the effects of all amfetamine type stimulants are related to what point they are at on their menstrual cycle – it is only very recently this research has been done in NL (where society actually has a lot more trust in authorities in general and there is also a lot easier access to individuals healthcare data than in the UK!).
There are also gender issues in the UK and perhaps the wider Anglosphere where girls/young women have become more reliant on males to give them drug advice rather than searching it out independently for themselves; leading to completely unintentional dosage errors as many young men may be worried giving a girl less would look unfair or even sexist, and it would be even more awkward to ask the same girl “what time of the month” she is at!
At 41 she might have had confounding health problems like heart or circulatory issues.
Fucking Tiesto, him and Armin Van Buuren are in their late 40’s and late 30’s respectively kinda gives you an idea how long rave culture has been around. As far as harm reduction, its almost non existent in the USA but people still try to look out for each other: “don’t roll multiple days in a row”, “take 5-HTP afterwards”, “don’t take too much if its from a new source”, “don’t mix uppers and downers”, “why are you drinking on E”, and 1000 and 1 other things, but some people just don’t listen or think they’re invincible.
I wish the christian right in america would discuss drugs.
As far as girls and newbies, people would sometimes try to talk them into buying a smaller dose or if the girl is getting it for free then just give them a bit smaller of an amount; as far as women’s holiday is concerned I don’t think a dealer would ever ask that… I’d fall out laughing if I heard that.
Inquest report from a festival in southern England earlier this year. In this, it appears that the young womans boyfriend and her peer group were themselves worried about her level of drug use (the stacking of “uppers and downers” can be particularly risky) but were unable to convince her to take less.
Teenager found dead at BoomTown died after taking ‘cocktail of drugs’ | Metro News
Probably the Etizolam that did her in or being female and taking tons of MDMA. Either way this happens every year multiple times a year, someone does way too many drugs at a festival and dies.
its only comparatively recently that fatal incidents from party drugs/affecting younger users have shot through the roof like this, and across the globe as well – I would pin it down to the last 5 years.
10-15 years ago when I was more active with partying I lived in what was a fairly middle class affluent suburban town just outside London and did notice my peers usage patterns becoming riskier – but no one actually died though although ketamine+other stuff took its toll on some peoples physical and mental health.
IMO the trend towards multi day festivals (as opposed to smaller, one night events) and balkanisation of EDM events into certain areas/districts of countries (happens everywhere even in “liberal” countries like NL and DE) as well as social engineering to make young people “grow out of it!” after age 25 has increased the risks especially to younger people as they don’t want to miss out on multi day events, might want to stay up multiple nights, or feel they must cram as much in as possible as “I have to give it up when I turn 25/30”.
Some scentific research about the gender differences (via a University Hospital in Switzerland) here: http://press.endocrine.org/doi/abs/10.1210/jc.2011-1143
@General Lighting 986844 wrote:
In the 90s/00s I remember a lot more young women reducing their use / moving away from the rave scene quicker than young men, and pointing out that heavy use caused them “womens problems”, although pills were not as strong then and cost more so gross overdoses were very uncommon.
The article also points out risks to all current users of accidentally taking much more MDMA than they wanted to..
Interested to read, hope it doesn’t seem obvious bullshit.
its backed up by the Switzerland research (that is way more complex and written for boffins/healthcare professionals though) and also matches the anecdotal evidence from the lasses I knew in the 90s/00s. TBH I suspect the risk to male users is only marginally less, by perhaps a few tens of miligrams as I am also seeing reports of young teenage lads keeling over from strong pills, and equally worrying older males 40+.
In this last case I suspect these are chaps who might have calmed down due to starting families or career demands but don’t realise pills are 2-4 times stronger than “back in the day”. The festival welfare crews also confirm they end up dealing with situations like this (although thankfully in most cases the user just gets a scare and no lasting harm).
This the the article (NL) about older female users – headline is “an occasionally xtc-pill is a part of myself, not a part of my parenting skills”
@General Lighting 986892 wrote:
its backed up by the Switzerland research (that is way more complex and written for boffins/healthcare professionals though) and also matches the anecdotal evidence from the lasses I knew in the 90s/00s. TBH I suspect the risk to male users is only marginally less, by perhaps a few tens of miligrams as I am also seeing reports of young teenage lads keeling over from strong pills, and equally worrying older males 40+.
In this last case I suspect these are chaps who might have calmed down due to starting families or career demands but don’t realise pills are 2-4 times stronger than “back in the day”. The festival welfare crews also confirm they end up dealing with situations like this (although thankfully in most cases the user just gets a scare and no lasting harm).
This the the article (NL) about older female users – headline is “an occasionally xtc-pill is a part of myself, not a part of my parenting skills”
You could be right in what you say GL but back in the day MDMA was of much lower purity. A 150mg dose back in the day would not be equivalent to a 150mg dose at todays levels of purity. I think that’s gonna play a big factor in what people experience today, especially for people who dabbled back in the day.
That is insane, even I wouldn’t go near that sort of insane comboing. Fucking hell, no wonder she’s dead but my money would be on the etizolam and alcohol.
@tryptameanie 986894 wrote:
You could be right in what you say GL but back in the day MDMA was of much lower purity. A 150mg dose back in the day would not be equivalent to a 150mg dose at todays levels of purity. I think that’s gonna play a big factor in what people experience today, especially for people who dabbled back in the day.
The best of pills from 1991-1992 mostly were pure MDMA but the content was around 80-100 mg for a good pill. And that was plenty enough. There were spikes in higher purity around various times after that (around 1994-1995, 2005-2006) and from around 2009-2010 onward the really strong ones started appearing. But even then 150mg was rare.
It started just after I decided to learn Dutch and I was regularly reading warnings about them on Dutch news websites.
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Forums › Drugs › Ecstasy & MDMA › MDMA risk levels may be gender specific