In August 2022, we published Spiking: what universities can do, a practice note aiming to support universities’ response to spiking.
The guidance has been positively received by the sector and has already been used by universities to inform and improve their responses to the issue.
The nature of spiking means it can be very difficult for victims to know afterwards what has happened to them, and like many crimes, spiking is significantly under-reported to the police.
However, data published by the National Police Chiefs’ Council shows that there were just under 5,000 reports of spiking from September 2021 to August 2022. Of those, approximately half reported spiking by needle, and 43% were reports of drink spiking.
