Having your ‘drink spiked’ is where someone adds a substance to your drink, alcohol or drugs, without you knowing.
This happens often with the intention of causing further harm to you e.g. stealing, coercing into illegal activity or rape. Please watch out for the following symptoms when consuming non-alcoholic and alcoholic drinks at parties, pre-drinks at people’s houses and in pubs and bars.
- suddenly feeling more drunk that the amount of drink warrants
- lowered inhibitions
- difficulty concentrating or speaking
- loss of balance and finding it hard to move
visual problems, particularly blurred vision
memory loss (amnesia) or “blackouts” - feeling confused or disorientated, particularly after waking up (if you have been asleep)
- paranoia (a feeling of fear or distrust of others)
hallucinations (seeing, hearing or touching things that aren’t there) or having an “out of body” experience - nausea and vomiting
- unconsciousness
If you feel you, or someone else, has been spiked- seek help immediately. Call 999. Medical attention may be necessary and the police should be informed. Most drugs last between 12 – 72 hours so it’s important to be tested as soon as you fear a drink has been spiked.
Blood tests and urine tests are the usual method of testing for spiked drinks.
Remember:
- make sure you always know where your drink is, keep an eye on it or out of other people’s reach
- if your drink tastes funny or salty, do not drink it, throw it away.
- drinking out of bottles/cans is slightly safer, keep your thumb over the top
- ‘mindsweeping’ is dangerous (drinking other people’s drinks, left unattended, common if you have run out of money to buy any more drinks)
- drinks handed to you from strangers could be spiked, always make sure you can see drinks opened/poured in front of you
- ensure you are with friends/people that you trust to get you to safety if you need it.
- look out for your friends, don’t just assume someone is drunk off alcohol if they are acting more drunk than you could predict usually.
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