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Ecstasy Surge in Los Angeles Triggers Death, 18 Hospitalized after Rave
Rising use of the stimulant hallucinogen known as ecstasy led to 18 hospitalizations and one death after a New Year’s Eve dance party attended by 45,000 people in Los Angeles, a U.S. investigation found.
The hospitalizations resulted from overdoses during the party, not from contaminated pills, according to the report by the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in Atlanta. One patient was admitted to the intensive-care unit with multiple organ failure. Another partygoer, not included in the tally, died after consuming ecstasy, cocaine and heroin.
The study is the first to examine a cluster of ecstasy- triggered hospital visits after an all-night electronic dance party known as a rave. Use of the drug is increasing, and many overdoses go underreported, according to the report. The number of patients at treatment programs in Los Angeles County citing ecstasy as their drug of choice increased almost sevenfold from 2005 to 2009.
“Patients began to arrive at emergency departments shortly after the rave began,” investigators wrote in the report. “This cluster occurred in the setting of a likely overall increase in ecstasy use in Los Angeles County during 2005-2009, indicating a possible ongoing and underreported public health problem.”
The party in the report was held at a rented public facility owned jointly by the city of Los Angeles and the state of California. Three separate stages featured music from 6 p.m. local time on December 31 to 4 a.m. on January 1. Raves are all- night dance parties that began in the 1980s at abandoned warehouses and outdoor areas, according to the report. More recently, raves have become organized events.
Ecstasy Preference
Forensic specimens containing ecstasy in Los Angeles County more than doubled to 13.4 cases per 100,000 residents in 2009 from 5.2 cases per 100,000 in 2005. Ecstasy preference at clinics increased to 1.65 cases per 100,000 residents, from 0.22 per 100,000, according to the study.
A tablet obtained from one of the patients contained equal parts of MDMA, the chemical name for ecstasy, and caffeine. Thirteen of the patients had also ingested alcohol or other drugs including marijuana and prescription medications.
About 894,000 people in the U.S. used ecstasy for the first time in 2008, a 45 percent increase from 2005, according to an annual survey conducted by the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration.
To contact the reporter on this story: Tom Randall in New York at trandall6@bloomberg.net.
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