Starting in July, California establishments with liquor licenses will be required to sell kits to test to detect drink drugging.
“Don’t get roofied! Drink spiking drug test kits available here. Ask a staff member for details.”
Come July, that verbiage will feature prominently in liquor license-holding venues throughout California. They will be required to do so — as well as offer the tests at a reasonable price — thanks to a bill that was passed in the fall of last year.
AB-1013 was introduced by Californian State Assembly member Josh Lowenthal that April. “As we all know we have a crisis with fentanyl in California, but it is not the only crisis we have,” he said during a hearing. “We have a crisis taking place that is resulting in sexual assault, that’s targeting primarily women and members of the LGBTQ+ communities.”
The bill passed its first assembly vote 18-0 with bipartisan support in April. California Governor Gavin Newsom approved it the following October.
Surveys conducted by Alcohol.org suggest that around 44% of men and 56% of women unknowingly consume spiked drinks or food. Of those, 37% have it happen to them multiple times. More than half of the men and an even higher proportion of the women do not report these incidents to authorities.
Alcohol.org also asserts that alcohol itself is the most common substance used to facilitate sexual assault. Drugs like Rohypnol, ketamine, GHB, and ecstasy are some of the others frequently used by assailants.
“I have members of my staff that have been roofied,” Lowenthal had said in the April hearing. “There are members of the legislative body that have been roofied.”
While drink drugging and sexual assault will continue to be a widespread issue in California and beyond, it seems like nobody can deny that bill AB-1013 is a step in the right direction.
