The Australian state of Queensland has banned the testing of drugs for recreational use, sparking warnings from health providers on Friday that the move could put lives at risk.

Queensland ranks third-highest in Australia for drug use, the latest government data show, with around one in five people in the state reporting they had used in the past twelve months.

Late on Thursday, the government of the northeastern state said it would ban funding for testing which checks the chemical purity of drugs for users to see if they have been laced with other harmful substances.

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The state’s health minister Tim Nicholls said the government had a “zero-tolerance approach to illicit drugs”.

“There is no safe way to take drugs,” he said. “Drug checking services send the wrong message to Queenslanders.”

Cameron Francis, chief executive of non-profit The Loop Australia, a testing service that operated in Queensland, told AFP he was “disappointed and saddened” by the decision.

“Without a service like pill testing, we have no idea what is circulating until it is too late,” he told AFP.

The Loop had run a government-funded year-long trial in the state and tested 1,200 drugs, he said.

Of those samples, one in seven drugs were disposed of after being tested, while one in three people were referred to other health services, Francis explained.

One in five people who participated said they would reduce their drug use in the future.

Australia’s drug market is becoming more dangerous with an increase of synthetic opioid drugs such as fentanyl, he warned.

Some 3.9 million people — around 18 percent of Australians aged 14 and over — used an illicit drug in the past year, official figures show.

Australian Medical Association state president Nick Yim said the move could spark a surge in hospitalisations in emergency departments, particularly during the upcoming summer festival season.

Official data show there were 1,635 drug-induced deaths across Australia in 2023 — the majority of which were considered accidental.

Queensland is the first Australian state to ban drug testing.

Some services or government-backed trials remain in place in the Australian Capital Territory as well as Victoria and New South Wales, home to the country’s largest cities of Melbourne and Sydney.

Testing kits can still be purchased online.

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