Buenos Aires, the capital of Argentina, will no longer be issuing permits for major music festivals after five people died at the Time Warp Festival due to drug overdose .
The new measure was announced by Buenos Aires Mayor Horacio Rodriguez in response to the reported deaths in the festival on April 15. The mayor claimed that the rule will take effect until a new law, banning drug abuse will be applicable to the same kind of events, according to 680 News. Another five people who attended the festival remain in critical condition, and are still in the local hospital. The authorities had arrested five connected to the drug incident.
"They are all in very grave condition, intubated," Dr Alberto Crescenti, director of the Emergency Medical Attention System in Buenos Aires, told the Todo Noticias station. "They are not breathing on their own."
The festival in Costa Salguero in Buenos Aires had gone out of control, BBC reports. Crescenti said that the victims' age range from 21 to 25 and were suspected of acute poisoning. Private ambulances immediately came to the event. However, it couldn't manage all the victims so the Buenos Aires' emergency service came to help. Time Warp is one of the major music events in Buenos Aires and is now in its third year. Time Warp originated in Germany in 1994.
"We couldn't stay inside, we couldn't breathe," one of the participants told local TV channel TN. "It was too hot and there were too many people."
The DJ's performing for the now-cancelled festival include, Barem, Chris Liebing, and Deep Mariano. Meanwhile, SMH claims that a bus full of party goers from the festival was apprehended by authorities. The police in La Plata confiscated assorted drugs such as cocaine, poppers, doses of LSD and ecstacy pills.
The Buenos Aires festival is scheduled for Friday and Saturday, but the second night has been suspended due to the drug-related deaths. Buenos Aires officials announced the closure of the venue on Saturday.
