My daughter died of an MDMA overdose – now I battle online drug dealers targeting kids – six red flags to spot
CAMPAIGNING mum Janine Milburn, whose daughter died from an MDMA overdose, reveals how online dealers are enticing more and more young people into their murky world.
Janine Milburn clicked on the faceless Instagram account, typed out a message and pressed send.
Seconds later, her phone pinged and she recoiled as she read the reply.
She’d asked what he sold, and he sent back “What are you interested in?” Before going on to talk about delivery fees and payment being via Bitcoin PayPal.
Shockingly, in the space of just ten minutes, the 46-year-old mum had managed to negotiate a £300 supply of MDMA, cocaine, and ketamine.
Most worryingly he wanted to create a ‘long term business relationship’ and despite saying that MDMA was £10 a pill, ketamine £45 a bottle and cocaine £40 per gram, he offered her six bottles of ketamine, four grams of cocaine and 25 pills of MDMA for £300 — a ‘discount’ of £420, which could be at her door via courier service within 24 hours.
It was a risky experiment and Janine had no intention of going through with the deal or revealing her address.
By the following morning her profile was being followed by five drug dealers. She later blocked all of the accounts.
But her experience paints a horrifying picture of just how easy it is to access drugs via social media — one that is bound to send shockwaves through parents everywhere.
She says: “I’ve every reason to believe that if I’d paid the £300 I’d have got the drugs. It all happened so fast.
“Within minutes I got a message back saying the drugs could be posted or delivered to me, once we’d agreed a price.
“They didn’t ask a single question about me, or my age.”
While Home Secretary Suella Braverman pledged earlier this week to make nitrous oxide, otherwise known as laughing gas, a Class C drug by the end of the year — meaning users could face up to two years in prison — drug charity experts say there is a much bigger issue at play.
On social media apps such as Instagram and Snapchat, children as young as 11 are paying as little as £10 for a gram of cannabis.
They pool their pocket money to buy the substances, including nitrous oxide, enticed by appalling deals such as buy two grams get one free.
‘Can of worms’
Dealers can be identified on social media as they often put an emoji of a plug into their usernames or bios and write on their stories that they are ‘Active.’
And with 90 per cent of teenagers having social media accounts — many under the minimum legal age requirements — Janine knows first-hand what can happen when children wade into the murky world of illegal substances.
Her daughter Georgia was 18 when she died in 2018, six hours after taking class A drug ecstasy (MDMA) at a music festival.
As part of her daughter’s legacy, Janine has made it her mission to educate young people about the dangers of drugs.
And she wants to warn other parents just how easy it is for kids to get their hands on potentially lethal substances.
She says: “I specifically searched for MDMA, the drug which took Georgia’s life — it was so easy.
“I just keyed in MDMA and accounts came up with names like ‘pills for sale’. I clicked on various profiles.
“All together I messaged four accounts and two got back to me.
“It was the same when I searched for ketamine and cocaine. I began following various accounts that I suspected sold them and sent direct messages.”
Alarming research carried out by UCL found that among 17-year-olds in the UK, one in ten have used hard drugs such as ketamine and cocaine.
And more than 14,000 under-18s were in contact with drug and alcohol services between April 2019 and March 2020, according to NHS Digital.
Gillian Collier, young persons recovery worker and child criminal exploitation lead for drug and alcohol charity We Are With You, believes social media is a huge area of concern.
She says: “Social media has opened a massive can of worms. Cannabis is the number one illegal drug kids are getting their hands on.
“A gram costs around £10 and some children put pocket money together for substances, kids as young as 11.
“They’re putting THC — the part of cannabis that gets people high — into vapes.
“Nitrous oxide is put in balloons and inhaled. It’s really dangerous and kids don’t know this is illegal.
“There’s offers like buy two grams and get the third gram free. Or, refer a friend and get money off.”
Janine, a family support worker lives in Havant, Hants, with husband Daniel 46, an IT worker, and has two other daughters, Charlotte, 28, and Dannielle, 26.
She began to check out social media after talking to other parents who had lost children to drugs and discovered many had accessed them via online platforms.
She recalls: “I met mothers and we set up a private Facebook support group called Parents Army and through that I’ve talked to mothers whose children died after accessing drugs on social media.
“Georgia had dabbled with drugs at house parties before her death.
“She was 17 when she blurted it out after I picked her up from work one night. That was ten months before she died.
“She told me she’d tried cannabis but she didn’t like the smell or taste and that she’d tried cocaine but didn’t like how it made her feel.
“She assured me it had been a one-off. Whether that’s true or not I will never know, but it certainly wasn’t habitual.”
Eighteen months after losing Georgia, Janine channelled her grief into helping others, working with schools and youth charities to raise awareness of the risks of drug use.
Janine says: “Buying drugs these days is seamless and that’s what makes it so appealing to kids. It isn’t scary for them. It doesn’t involve a meeting down a back alley.
“And worryingly it feels as though children have become desensitised to the dangers.”
Furthermore, in 2022, 1,736 under-17s were held by police for dealing drugs, or having such large quantities of drugs that they were suspected of doing so.
And that figure comes from only 30 out of 44 police forces in England and Wales.
One mum, Jayne, recently found out Jasmine, her 16-year-old daughter (both names changed) arranged to meet a dealer in her local park where she paid £50 for a vape laced with THC.
“I was horrified,” says the 48-year-old. “She told me she had gone out before the Boardmasters Festival in Cornwall and arranged to meet a dealer who a school friend had met via social media and recommended.
“It’s just ten minutes away from our home. She was so matter of fact about it, like it’s what everyone does, no big deal.”
Jasmine went on to confide in Jayne that one of her oldest friends was receiving counselling for her cannabis use and that some of her other friends were taking ketamine, an illegal drug which can cause hallucinations.
‘Right information’
Jayne explains: “She said one took it regularly, even in her bedroom with no friends around.
“And another had even taken cocaine at school which she’d got on Instagram.”
We Are With You worker Gillian believes the charity is making important inroads and that continuing to talk to children in the youngest age group is crucial.
She adds: “Early education is everything and is why it’s so important for us to get into primary schools and educate kids.
“We’re working with year five and six kids and receiving fantastic feedback from teachers.
“We work on peer pressure too. We ask kids, ‘Do you feel comfortable saying no?’.
“We’ve had some fantastic outcomes but our caseload has increased.”
She adds: “Anybody’s child can use drugs.
“Even those from the strictest backgrounds can rebel and they often have the money. There’s no class differentiation.
“We can’t wave a magic wand and stop every young person from using substances, but we work hard to reduce the risk of harm so they have the right information to make the right decisions.”
And while it’s too late to save Georgia, Janine says she hopes her legacy will live on through her mission to educate others.
“I think Georgia would still be here now if she’d had better education around drugs,” she adds.
“While I’m well aware we can’t stop drug use completely, if I help to teach kids about harm reduction, for example telling them the realities of what drugs do what, and the importance of drug testing kids and never experimenting on their own, and equally telling parents the importance of getting help if you think your child has a drug problem, it can save lives.
“Even if I save just one, that’s worth everything to me.”
RED FLAGS IN ROUTINE
A TEEN’s changing behaviour could indicate any manner of mental health problems, says Gillian Collier, child criminal exploitation lead for drug and alcohol charity We Are With You.
But these actions could signal your child is buying drugs online…
THEY LEAVE THE ROOM EVERY TIME THEIR PHONE PINGS
IF your teen starts using the phone less in your presence, it could be a sign they are hiding something from you.
Watch out for them leaving the room as soon as they get a notification.
Or they might just turn it onto silent constantly.
THEY BECOME VERBALLY ABUSIVE
TEENS can go into fight or flight mode when faced with being caught out.
They might start shouting, crying or having a tantrum if they feel they’re in danger of being discovered with drugs.
THEY HAVE A NEW GROUP OF FRIENDS
ONE of the main indicators of substance abuse is a new friendship group.
Bluebirds fly with bluebirds – those using substances usually hang around with each other.
They might also leave people they have been pals with for years.
THEY’VE STARTED TO DRESS DIFFERENTLY
YOU may see your teen trying to fit in, especially if they’ve started hanging out with new people who use drugs.
One minute they’re in Levis with long hair, and the next they’re in tracksuit bottoms with cropped hair – as that’s what their new group wears.
THEY’RE DISAPPEARING MORE AND MORE
THEY could be leaving the house and not coming home for a few hours.
They might want to stay out longer to wait for the effect of the drugs to wear off.
Do they smell different? Have their eyes changed? Look at behaviour when they return.
THERE’S A CHANGE IN THEIR APPETITE
THERE are many reasons why young people might experience a change in appetite, including mental health issues.
And different substances can have different effects.
For instance, cannabis users might get hungrier, while cocaine and amphetamines can make you lose your appetite.