Newcastle student launches petition calling for Students' Union to give out free drug testing kits after student deaths
A Newcastle student has set up a petition, calling for the Students' Union to give out free drug testing kits.
It's after four young people died in one weekend - two of them were students at the University of Newcastle, and one was a student at Northumbria University.
Police suspect their deaths were drug related.
Police make ten arrests after four young people die in suspected drugs incidents
Now, Maddie Roberts believes we should be taking action to make sure this doesn't happen again - saying "Understandably, the safest way to take drugs is to not take them at all, however we know that people still choose to do them and in 2018, the National Union of Students found that around 2 in 5 students have taken drugs.
Drug testing kits are able to detect dangerous substances in drugs that can be potentially life threatening and this will allow those who choose to take drugs to be better equipped and have a greater understanding of what they are putting into their bodies, leading them to make a more educated, and therefore safer, decision."
The petition has already had over 1500 signatures, with many giving similar reasons for why they chose to support the calls.
We spoke to Maddie about why she set up the petition:
Speaking to Newcastle Students' Union they said: "the Student Union supports this initiative and our Welfare and Equality Officer will be discussing it further with the University."