The Head of Service of the Deputy General Directorate for the Coordination of Programs of the Government Delegation for the National Plan on Drugs, Carlos Belmar Ramírez, has stressed that chemsex "is a priority in the future National Strategy on Addictions", as it is "a complex and changing reality".
In this practice, "pleasure, desire, and sociability coexist with significant risks to physical, mental, and social health," he pointed out during the "Chemsex, only chemistry" conference, organized by the Intervention Commission of UNAD, the Network for Addiction Care, which brought together specialists from various fields.
From their perspective, public health must "sustain that complexity", avoiding limiting itself to the mere surveillance of risks and betting on "understanding contexts and accompanying people with respect, dignity, and autonomy". In this sense, they have reiterated the importance of "avoiding criminalizing responses and working in a coordinated manner between Administrations, social entities, professionals, and users".
According to the organization, the speakers have agreed on "the need to reinforce coordination between social and health resources to improve the response to the phenomenon of chemsex and other sexualized drug use". The vice-president of UNAD, Elisabeth Ortega, has underlined that it is fundamental to address chemsex "with rigor, without simplifications and from a public health perspective".
For this reason, he defends "intervention models focused on rights, risk reduction, and support". Furthermore, he has stressed the urgency of "building effective, humane, and non-stigmatizing responses, which are not limited to substance use and also incorporate social and emotional factors, such as isolation, the stigma associated with HIV, LGTBIfobia, or certain situations of exclusion and psychological distress".
The member of the UNAD Intervention Commission, José Luis Rabadán, has recalled that the sexualized uses of drugs "very often" did not find "a clear fit either in traditional addiction treatment resources or in other health or social services". In the same vein, consultant and trainer Raúl Soriano has pointed out that "not all sexualized drug use is chemsex".
Other scenarios of sexualized substance use
Soriano has added that "there are also other contexts of sexualized consumption of substances related to couples, prostitution, swingers clubs or consumption linked to pornography". However, he has specified that chemsex occurs "mainly among gay, bisexual and other men who have sex with men, with the aim of maintaining, intensifying or prolonging sexual relations for long periods of time".
In this framework, he has detailed that "among the substances most associated with this practice are mephedrone, GHB/GBL and methamphetamine, in addition to others such as cocaine, ketamine, alcohol or popper, frequently in situations of polysubstance use".
During the meeting, the experts have warned of "the reappearance of problems linked to injected drug use, overdoses, or abscesses", and have focused on "serious physical, psychological, and social impacts that can arise from these practices".
Likewise, they have emphasized that "Spain is among the European countries with the highest prevalence of chemsex, according to the European online survey for men who have sex with men (EMIS)". Finally, data such as "the addiction care network in Madrid has gone from attending 54 demands related to chemsex in 2017 to 912 in 2025" have been presented, reflecting the strong increase in this phenomenon in recent years.