Unstoppable? Dance Drug Use in the UK Club Scene

Abstract

As the first generation of drug using and drug experienced 1990s youth move into adulthood, a key research and policy question must be — will they settle down and leave drug use behind them, or ‘carry over’ their recreational drug use as the new twentysomething population? In this chapter we summarise the findings of the largest UK study to date of drug use in the nightclub/dance club scene. We find a very drug experienced population on the dance floor. Their drugs histories and path-ways from adolescence, plus their current alcohol—poly drug repertoires, make them, by any measure, very drug involved. They are undoubtedly at the most serious end of recreational drug use.