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QUICK INFO JUMP
Get the Facts
Before You Risk It
Know the Signs
Q&A
Info
Get the Facts
Ecstasy affects your brain. Ecstasy is often used at all-night dance parties (“raves”), nightclubs, and concerts. Ecstasy can damage the neurons in your brain, impairing your senses, memory, judgment, and coordination.
Ecstasy affects your body. Ecstasy is a stimulant that increases your heart rate and blood pressure and can lead to heart or kidney failure.
Ecstasy is not always what it seems. Because ecstasy is illegal and often produced in makeshift laboratories, it is impossible to know exactly what chemicals were used to produce it and where it came from. How strong or dangerous any illegal drug is varies each time.
Ecstasy can kill you. Higher doses of ecstasy can cause severe breathing problems, coma, or even death.
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Before You Risk It
Know the law. It is illegal to buy or sell ecstasy. It is also a federal crime to use any controlled substance to aid in a sexual assault.
Get the facts. Despite what you may have heard, ecstasy can be addictive.
Know the risks. Mixing ecstasy with other drugs or with alcohol is extremely dangerous. The effects of one drug can magnify the effects and risks of another. In fact, mixing substances can be lethal.
Look around you. The vast majority of teens are not using drugs, including ecstasy. While ecstasy is considered to be the most frequently used club drug, less than 2 percent of 8th – 12th graders use it on a regular basis. In fact, 94 percent of teens have never even tried ecstasy.(1)
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Know the Signs
How can you tell if a friend is using club drugs? Sometimes it’s tough to tell. But there are signs you can look for. If your friend has one or more of the following warning signs, he or she may be using Ecstasy:
- Problems remembering things they recently said or did
- Loss of coordination, dizziness, fainting
- Depression
- Confusion
- Sleep problems
What can you do to help someone who is using ecstasy? Be a real friend. Save a life. Encourage your friend to stop or seek professional help. For information and referrals, call the National Clearinghouse for Alcohol and Drug Information at 800-729-6686.
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Q&A
Q. Are there any long-term effects of taking ecstasy?
A. Yes. Studies on both humans and animals have proven that regular use of ecstasy produces long-lasting, perhaps permanent damage to the brain’s ability to think and store memories.
Q. If you took ecstasy at a rave, wouldn’t you just dance off all of its effects?
A. Not necessarily. The stimulant effects of drugs like ecstasy that allow the user to dance for long periods of time, combined with the hot, crowded conditions usually found at raves, can lead to extreme dehydration and even heart or kidney failure. In addition, some of ecstasy’s effects, like confusion, depression, anxiety, paranoia, and sleep problems, have been reported to occur even weeks after the drug is taken.
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Info
To learn more about Ecstasy, or obtain referrals to programs in your community, contact:
SAMHSA's National Clearinghouse for Alcohol and Drug Information
800-729-6686
TDD 800-487-4889
linea gratis en español 877-767-8432
Web site: ncadi.samhsa.gov 
The bottom line: If you know someone who uses ecstasy, urge him or her to get help. If you’re using them—stop! The longer you ignore the real facts, the more chances you take with your life.
It's never too late. Talk to your parents, a doctor, a counselor, a teacher, or another adult you trust.
Do it today!
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1. Monitoring the Future Study. National Institute on Drug Abuse (NIDA), 1999.
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