I have experienced this first hand and it is a scary and awful experience. Not being an expert on this date rape drug issue, I woke up the next day feeling OK but not recalling anything from around 11pm onward. However, I was soon informed about my inappropriate behavior from my friend and the hostess of the gathering. Naturally I felt simply terrible, totally embarrassed but also completely perplexed. If some women are able to appreciate the likely cause of total memory loss followed by inappropriate behavior and are together enough to get to a hospital post haste to be tested for any potential drug, they are a better woman than I. I simply felt overwhelmed,totally confused and needed a good 48 hours to fully process the turn of events to appreciate what must have occurred. For reasons I don't wish to bore folks with, I did and still do feel confident that the purpose of giving me this drug was not sexually motivated but more likely for entertainment value and/or testing out the impact of the drug?
When I shared my conclusions with this friend of mine who hosted this event about feeling confident my drink had been spiked, I never heard back after a couple of attempts. However, in retrospect, I was being naive as her #2 son had been through very serious drug issues and this would not be an event she would want to become involved with. I still proceeded to make a police report but the response of the office was quite unfortunate as he kept interrupting me as well as challenging me, thereby putting me on the defensive. So I never really got the complete story reported in any type of coherent fashion. I considered returning to make another report, now knowing what to expect and ready to be calm and clear. But the drive is considerable and, for better or worse, I just let it go. I have since discussed this with a number of female students and many can relate to this event from knowing someone to whom it happened. However, they also add that the woman never considered making a police report or going to a hospital for a drug testing as they simply wanted the whole experience to go away--disappear. With guys like in the film, "Hangover," it's funny; with women, it's not and the fundamental attribution error begins to kick in immediately. So, from my experience as well as anecdotes from my female students, I strongly believe that if we wish to determine how common this type of event is, we cannot rely on hospital reports or police reports but, instead, should rely more on objective and systematic self-report studies of younger women. Joan Joan Warmbold Boggs [email protected] > Date rape drugging is not a myth -- it's just that the predominant drug is > ethanol. > > On Nov 14, 2011, at 10:19 PM, <[email protected]> > <[email protected]> wrote: > >> A new "DAWN report" from the US Department of Health appears to >> confirm fears that date-rape drugging is a widespread phenomenon and >> a serious risk for young women. >> >> In their report, they use the general term "intentional poisoning" to >> cover cases where drugs have been deliberately used to cause harm or >> to prevent a person from defense against another crime (e.g. rape). >> According to statistics they compiled from visits to emergency >> departments in the USA, almost 15,000 were cases of deliberate >> poisoning, amounting to 32% of all drug-related visits to emergency >> departments. Nearly 2/3 of those classified as intentionally poisoned >> were women. As for the drugs involved, 60% were unidentified. >> >> The initial press report of this study (USA Today at >> http://tinyurl.com/7s8u43g ) uses it to emphasize the widespread >> nature of this practice, noting "According to the data, about 60 >> percent of these cases occurred after someone surreptitiously slipped >> a drug into the victim's drink.". They also say "such poisonings >> have been implicated in the rapes of an estimated 3 million American >> women, although in reality that figure could be considerably higher." >> >> This is disturbing stuff. Yet I find it curious that the experience >> in the UK seems to be strikingly different. In one report (Hughes et >> al, 2007) of emergency department admissions in Wales, they studied >> cases of alleged drink spiking over the past year and analysed urine >> samples, of which 19% tested positive for "drugs of misuse". The >> drugs identified were amphetamine, cocaine, and morphine. None >> involved traditional date-rape drugs. They concluded "Most patients >> allegedly having had a spiked drink test negative for drugs of >> misuse. The symptoms are more likely to be a result of excess >> alcohol." >> >> A reader's comment (Al-Jafari, 2007) was more pointed. He said: "The >> study of alledged victims of drink 'spiking' by Hughes et al raises a >> few issues not addressed in their paper. I note that of the 8 >> patients who tested positive for drugs of misuse, not a single one >> tested positive for a tradition 'date rape' drug such as Ketamine, >> Rohypnol or GHB. One possible explanation is that the drugs, >> including amphetamines, ecstasy, cocaine and opiates, were knowingly >> taken by the patients. On realising that they were suffering from ill >> effects, rather than admitting that they had knowingly taken illicit >> substances for fear of repercussions, they may have used 'spiking' as >> an excuse. >> >> Another study (Greene et al, 2007) analyzed blood and urine samples >> of 78 participants, mostly young women. All had presented at an inner >> city London emergency department claiming to have been the victim of >> drink spiking. Alcohol was detected in most cases, and in 60% of >> cases indicated significant intoxication. Sedative drugs were >> detected in only 3% of participants. >> >> They concluded, "Use of sedative drugs to spike drinks may not be as >> common as reported in the mainstream media. A large number of study >> participants had serum ethanol concentrations associated with >> significant intoxication; the source (personal over-consumption or >> deliberate drink spiking) is unclear." >> >> A third, a review paper (Burgess et al, 2009), comments, "There is a >> stark contrast between heightened perceptions of risk associated with >> drug-facilitated sexual assault (DFSA) and a lack of evidence that >> this is a widespread threat." A news article in _The Telegraph_ >> (http://tinyurl.com/yjlh6hj ) on the research explicitly quotes one >> of the researchers as calling drink spiking "an urban legend" and >> that "police have found no evidence that rape victims are commonly >> drugged with such substances". >> >> Finally, an Australian study (Quigley et al, 2009) examined the >> situation at a Perth hospital, and reported "We did not identify a >> single case where a sedative drug was likely to have been illegally >> placed in a drink..Drink spiking with sedative or illict drugs >> appears to be rare". A news report on their study is at >> http://tinyurl.com/7eb58wj >> >> >> So here's the question. Is date-rape drugging largely a myth, as >> these UK and one Australian paper suggest, or is it a real and >> serious problem, as the recent USA DAWN report indicates? >> >> Some possibilities: >> >> 1) Is it a time difference? The UK studies were reported in 2007; >> the DAWN report in 2011. Greene doesn't say (in the abstract anyway) >> when the data were collected, but Hughes says 2004, and DAWN, 2009. >> Yet five years seems a rather implausibly short time for the >> situation to evolve from myth to reality. >> >> 2) is it a difference in national character? Are Americans poisoners, >> and the Brits dissemblers? Possibly, I'd say, but unlikely. >> >> 3) Is it a difference in methodology? >> >> DAWN indicates that a case is considered to be "intentional >> poisoning" when "A patient´s ED [emergency department] >> chart indicates that she or he was deliberately >> drugged by another person with the intent of >> causing harm (e.g., drug-facilitated sexual assault)." >> >> They also say that "It should be noted that, within these cases, >> toxicology tests may not always be conducted.". If not based on >> toxicology, how does the information about 'deliberately poisoned" >> get to the patients' charts? They do not say explicitly, but most >> likely, the information is obtained through self-report. >> >> On the other hand, the UK and Australian results were based on blood >> and urine analysis, a more objective source of evidence than self- >> report. And given that most of the drugs claimed to have been used in >> the DAWN cases were unidentified and none of those identified >> included any of the standard date-rape ones, I'm more persuaded by >> the urban legend claim than the clear and present danger one. >> >> As campaigns to educate young women about the danger of leaving >> drinks unattended is a widespread phenomenon on university campuses, >> the issue is a critical one. Are these warnings a well-founded >> response to highly risky behaviour, or are we scaring the bejezus out >> of students with an urban legend which has no more validity than the >> one about razor blades in Halloween candy? >> >> Stephen >> >> >> References >> >> Burgess, A (2009). Embodying uncertainty? Understanding heightened >> risk perception of drink "spiking". British Journal of Criminology, >> 49, 848-862. [abstract at >> http://bjc.oxfordjournals.org/content/49/6/848.abstract ] >> >> Quigley, P. et al (2009). Prospective study of 101 patients with >> suspected drink spiking. Emergency Medicine Australasia, 21, 223-28. >> [free text at http://tinyurl.com/7l7sb2k ] >> >> Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services >> Administration, Center for Behavioral Health >> Quality and Statistics. (November 3, 2011). >> The DAWN Report: Drug-Related Emergency >> Department Visits Attributed to Intentional >> Poisoning. Rockville, MD. [free at >> http://oas.samhsa.gov/2k11/DAWN040/WEB_DAWN_040_HTML.pdf >> >> Hughes, H. et al (2007). A study of patients presenting to an >> emergency department having had a "spiked drink". Emergency Medicine >> Journal, 24, 89-91. [free text at >> http://emj.bmj.com/content/24/2/89.full >> >> Greene, s. et al (2007). What's being used to spike your drink? >> Alleged spiked drink cases in inner city London. Postgraduate Medical >> Journal, 83, 754-758. [abstract at >> http://pmj.bmj.com/content/83/986/754.abstract >> >> Al-Jafari, S. (2007). Letter: 'Spiked' drink or voluntary drug use? >> http://tinyurl.com/6ork6b2 >> >> >> -------------------------------------------- >> Stephen L. Black, Ph.D. >> Professor of Psychology, Emeritus >> Bishop's University >> >> Sherbrooke, Quebec, Canada >> >> >> e-mail: >> sblack >> at >> ubishops.ca >> >> --------------------------------------------- >> >> --- >> You are currently subscribed to tips as: [email protected]. >> To unsubscribe click here: >> http://fsulist.frostburg.edu/u?id=13438.3b5166ef147b143fedd04b1c4a64900b&n=T&l=tips&o=14163 >> or send a blank email to >> leave-14163-13438.3b5166ef147b143fedd04b1c4a649...@fsulist.frostburg.edu > > > --- > You are currently subscribed to tips as: [email protected]. > To unsubscribe click here: > http://fsulist.frostburg.edu/u?id=49240.d374d0c18780e492c3d2e63f91752d0d&n=T&l=tips&o=14175 > or send a blank email to > leave-14175-49240.d374d0c18780e492c3d2e63f91752...@fsulist.frostburg.edu > --- You are currently subscribed to tips as: [email protected]. 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