On February 1st, a 19-year old male student from Coventry University in the UK died after taking an ecstasy pill while at a crowded school party. New research on the effects of ecstasy and other MDMA drugs suggests that his fate might’ve ended differently if he took the drug alone in his dorm room.
The student’s cause of death along with many other ecstasy-related deaths is hyperthermia or overheating. The majority of these cases occur at parties, raves, or music festivals where the environment is hot and crowded.
Researchers from the National Institute on Drug Abuse tested the effects of ecstasy on mice in social environments and solitary environments. Mice injected with ecstasy who were in a solitary, room-temperature setting experienced slight increases in body temperature but not to a fatal level. Mice in a warmer setting (about 84 degrees Fahrenheit) that was also occupied by another mouse suffered fatal increases in body temperature.
“MDMA at a moderate, nontoxic dose becomes highly toxic, causing fatal hyperthermia under environmental conditions commonly encountered in humans,” said Dr. Eugene A. Kiyatkin, researcher at the National Institutes of Health.
Raves and music festivals have shown an increase in popularity over the past decade with Electric Daisy Carnival, Bonnaroo, and Coachella being some of the most popular festivals. College students flock to these festivals to enjoy the music but may decide to try popular festival drugs like ecstasy.
From 2004-2011, there has been a 120% increase in emergency room visits due to ecstasy according to the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. Although not all of these cases are related to raves or music festivals, many of the severe cases are from young adults who were at some type of social environment.
The study from the National Institute on Drug Abuse explored ecstasy’s role in brain function. In room-temperature environments, the drug still impaired mice’s ability to regulate their own body temperature but not to the point of irreversible damage to the mouse’s brain tissues. This impairment of temperature regulation is amplified immensely in the presence of a hot environment. All mice injected with ecstasy in a warm environment died within 6 hours of injection due to overheating of the brain tissues.
The majority of music festivals take place during the spring and summer months where the chance of overheating due to ecstasy is much higher. The perception of ecstasy as a safe party drug continues to put many young adults at risk of overheating like the student from Coventry.
“In contrast to the popular belief that “recreational” use of MDMA is safe, our data demonstrate that exposure to MDMA combined with a specific combination of individual and environmental factors can in fact be deadly,” Kiyatkin said.
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