This past weekend, the Asian American community experienced a tragic loss. Nineteen-year-old Emily Tran of Anaheim, Calif., died of a suspected drug overdose while attending the summer music festival, HARD, in South El Monte, Calif.
According to a statement from the organizers of the concert, Tran began experiencing seizures. The teen was admitted into a health tent at 8:30 p.m. on Sunday, and was then taken to the hospital. Sadly, Tran passed away at about 5:30 a.m. the following morning.
Although the autopsy is still pending, there are major suspicions that drugs were involved in the death. According to LA Weekly, “sheriff’s officials believed the teen had turned up positive for signs of methamphetamine and ecstasy, although the latter is an amphetamine derivative that can set off signals of meth use.”
Unfortunately, this is not the first death associated with rave-like parties. In fact, electronic dance music (EDM) festivals were shut out of the L.A. Coliseum and Sports Arena in 2011 after a 15-year-old, who had sneaked into the a 2010 rave, died of an ecstasy overdose. Additionally, 24-year-old Montgomery Tsang passed away recently at Electric Daisy Carnival (EDC) in Las Vegas due to, once again, ecstasy overdose.
Although security was notably more strict at this year’s HARD festival, more than 100 people were arrested and many were narcotics related.
Some have pointed out that the Asian American community has a rather large presence at these rave-like parties, but we believe this issue of drug consumption is one that not only affects Asian American youth, but American youth in general. Could these overdoses have been prevented if the deceased knew more about the drugs they were consuming? What sort of steps can we take to prevent similar outcomes?
Tell us what you think.
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