Seven revellers had to be intubated at a music festival after overdosing on illegal drugs, with eight people in total still fighting for their lives.
The mass overdoses at the Hardmission Festival at Melbourne’s Flemington Racecourse happened over four hours on Saturday.
The victims, who are thought to have taken the party drug ecstasy, were rushed to hospitals including Royal Melbourne, St Vincent’s, Footscray, Sunshine and The Austin.
Victorian Ambulance Union general secretary Danny Hill recalled the horror saying eight were hospitalised, while seven needed to be intubated at the scene.
‘These were patients critically unwell and needed life-saving intervention so effectively they did not die,’ he told Sunrise on Monday morning.
Seven people are fighting for their lives in induced comas and after overdosing on illegal drugs at a dance music festival in Melbourne (pictured)
Video footage from the festival put on social media showed a person holding up a mobile phone with the word ‘Caps?’ written on the screen (pictured)
‘We had emergency doctors on scene who were providing intubation for patients but they were overwhelmed and had to call in paramedics to assist with care that is normally done within an energy department.’
Mr Hill noted the sweltering hot conditions would have also had an impact, and stressed the importance of introducing pill testing.
‘Not one of these drugs are safe but at least people can detect whether this is the very lethal variant that has done so much harm to at least eight people who’ve required critical care intervention,’ he said.
Paramedics from other parts of the city were called in at around 10.30pm to help with what Mr Hill called a ‘dire’ situation.
‘It’s quite a high level treatment that our paramedics perform and its reserved for our most time critical patients and patients in life threatening health conditions,’ he told the ABC.
‘It’s probably quite rare that we would see this amount of people needing such aggressive treatment.’
Video footage from the festival put on social media showed a person holding up a mobile phone with the word ‘Caps?’ written on the screen.
This is a word sometimes used by people looking to buy illegal drugs which come in capsules.
As temperatures soared to 32C, revellers danced shirtless, with some writing on social media that it was ‘too hot’.
Mr Hill said people going to such events need to find out about the dangers of taking illegal drugs such as ecstasy.
‘I think this highlights the dangers of some of the drugs that are passed around at rave parties and why there needs to be mechanisms to try and protect against them – it raises the issue of pill testing and pill checking.’
He said drugs sold at raves are sometimes laced with other chemicals and can have very dangerous side effects.
Mr Hill said the drug people get can ‘often be a lot different from what they think they have bought’.
Volunteers from alcohol and drugs harm reduction DanceWize were at the Hardmission Festival.
The mass overdose at the Hardmission Festival (pictured) on Flemington Racecourse happened over four hours on Saturday
A social media post of the Hardmission Festival, which took place in Melbourne on Saturday, is pictured
On Friday, the organisers posted on social media that ‘Hardmission is committed to ensuring a safe and enjoyable experience for all our attendees.
‘As part of our dedication to harm minimisation, we are proud to announce the presence of DanceWize at the event.
‘Your wellbeing is our priority. If you or someone you know needs assistance or support during the event, DanceWize will be on-site, ready to provide information, guidance and help with any harm reduction concerns.’
Daily Mail has contacted Hardmission and DanceWize for comment.
‘s spring/summer music festivals got off to a horror start on the first weekend of October with 18 people at two events rushed to hospital after suffering drug overdoses.
This happened despite the introduction of amnesty bins and a heavy police presence with sniffer dogs.
The festival season started with tens of thousands of revellers at the Knockout Outdoor at Sydney Olympic Park and Listen Out at Centennial Park in Sydney.
More than 70 people were arrested for drug possession and a further four for drug supply on that October weekend.
The arrests and hospitalisations come despite amnesty bins being set up at both events for revellers to discard drugs without the fear of being arrested.
The policy was introduced as a recommendation of a coronial inquest handed down in 2020 into the deaths of six young people at music festivals in NSW between December 2017 and January 2019.
‘s party season kicked off with Knockout Outdoor (pictured) and Listen Out festivals in October
Alex Ross-King, 19, Joshua Tam, 22, Callum Brosnan, 21, Diana Nguyen, 21, Joseph Pham, 23 all died at festivals after taking MDMA or ecstasy.
Five of the six festival goers also had other illegal substances in their system.
The inquest also recommended a number of other measures including pill testing, scrapping the use of sniffer dogs and reducing the number of strip searches.
The government rejected all recommendations with police sniffer dogs out in force over the weekend to deter drug use.