Mass Gathering Medicine at raves: Incidents and substance-related emergencies

Since the early 90s of the previous century a new phenomenon occurred in nightlife in The Netherlands. Dance, with large-scaled organized public events called house parties, also known as dance parties or raves, attended lots of visitors. Governmental authorities feared these events, because many attendees were thought to use a party drug in those days, called ecstasy, for its energetic and entactogenic effects. This substance was notorious, because of its assumed danger to public. At the start of the new century, again, party people discovered a new substance: Gamma-Hydroxybutyrate (GHB). Next to this, the use of alcohol seemed to increase among youth.