Nine students from two Utrecht student associations became unwell during a joint winter sports holiday in Rizoul, France. Four of them were briefly taken to the local hospital for a check-up.
The winter sports trip, in which about 475 first-year students took part, has ended prematurely due to the incidents, write the boards of the Utrecht Student Corps (USC) and the Utrechtsche Vrouwen Studenten Vereeniging (UVSV) in a letter to their members. “Affected members and their friends will be the first to get a chance to go home.” The first buses will leave on Thursday evening, two days earlier than planned.
“It was immediately noticeable that they all had the same, special complaints,” the two boards write in the letter. “These complaints included: spontaneously slumping through the legs, violent shaking, alternating laughing and crying, rolling away with the eyes, nausea and vomiting, panic attacks, memory loss, often approachable and clear of mind.” The students admitted are doing well under the circumstances, the boards write. “They all said they can’t remember anything about the incident.”
blood test
The winter sports enthusiasts in Rizoul think the victims have been drugged, says USC driver Douwe Korver. The association has sent additional board members to France to “monitor and provide support.” Korver emphasizes that there is still no confirmation that the victims were actually drugged: the results of blood tests are still pending.
The first incidents took place on Tuesday evening, says director Michiel Stoffels of tour operator Bohemian Birds. “The fright was good the next day. They are people who know each other well and who go out more often. In consultation with the boards, we have taken extra precautions, for example only serving drinks with lids or caps, closing the festival site and deploying extra staff.” However, on Wednesday evening, reports of “possible drugging” came in and two more students were sent to hospital, says Stoffels. “That was the last straw for us. That is why we have decided, together with the boards, to cut off the trip prematurely.”
All planned parties have been cancelled. The rest of the students will return to the Netherlands on Friday. The trip was actually supposed to end on Saturday. A larger group of senior students is on a winter sports holiday in Les Deux Alpes. That journey is going according to plan, the boards write.
‘Don’t like GHB’
The incidents and suspicions of drug use led to distrust among the winter sports students in Rizoul towards the local catering staff and other groups of holidaymakers, the boards write in their letter. “This did not benefit the atmosphere and caused unrest and panic, as a result of which a large part of the participants no longer enjoyed their trip.”
It is now raining bad reviews on social media at one of the larger party locations in the winter sports resort. “Doesn’t like GHB at all,” reads a one-star review. Tour operator Stoffels also says that the local catering industry has become a victim of “a rotten situation”. “After the first cases, the bar staff assisted us very well, for example giving us access to CCTV footage and talking to their staff – whether they might have seen something. Unfortunately, that did not have the desired effect. But at the moment it is actually not entirely clear what happened, let alone how it happened. That will have to become clear from research in the coming days and weeks.”