Survey: Spiked Drinks Growing Concern in Britain

A national survey in Great Britain finds that one in four young women had their alcoholic drinks spiked without their knowledge last year, the Guardian reported Sept. 9.

According to the survey by the Guardian newspaper and the television program "Dispatches," thousands of young women and gay men had their drinks spiked last year with date-rape drugs that are odorless, tasteless, and difficult to detect.

"What was quite moving was that a lot of the time some people would be very sincere and very confused about what had happened to them. It would be very much a case of they had had one drink and their friends were telling them how they were acting weirdly and they could not remember anything at all," said researcher Kate Quine.

The survey suggests that as many as 30 women a week became potential rape victims after their drinks were spiked. Although the number of rapes resulting from the spiked drinks was not determined by the survey, only 15 men have been convicted of drug-facilitated rape in the past five years.

Police in Britain plan to conduct their own national survey next month that would involve recording all rape and drink-spiking complaints.

Source: www.jointogether.org