Drug Laced Gummies at Boca Ciega High School
Last night I saw on the news, and Facebook, that my sons high school had kids eating gummies laced with drugs. I knew he wasn't involved, I asked anyways cause ya never know, could have been a joke gone bad or accidental by sharing things with friends.
So he said no, he didn't know who was involved as of last night but I am sure there will be plenty of talk going around the school tonight and there is a monthly parent meeting tomorrow night which I am sure this will be addressed.
There are comments all over about how of course this is in Florida and of course it's this school....but with a quick search on Google I was able to find out that obviously this is just about everywhere, this is not just here, not just at Boca Ciega and not just in Florida.
In California, a middle school with candy-like drugs, the "richest town in Georgia," prescription drug overdose in Washington, kids expelled in Connecticut, and the stories go on and on. It is not just here.....
I know I did not have to worry about mine this year but I have another son starting at Boca Ciega in the fall and him, him I have to worry about a little more. He likes to push boundaries, he likes to surround himself with trouble and it is not because of any lack in parenting, it is just who he is. I will not allow him to ruin his reputation or miss out on any opportunities for his future because of gummies or something like this. I know he knows better and he has talked about things openly with me and his father. I know this kind of stuff does not always happen on school grounds and it could easily happen while at a friends, or the movies, at the rec centers, anywhere. I need to make sure the school is going to be proactive about this to avoid it in the future.More so I need to be proactive about it in my household. While Googling other incidents like this I found a school in Ohio that is doing random drug testing. While I understand that may not be a possibility for all schools I do know I can do this at home.
So here is the story:
(via Tampa Bay Times)
GULFPORT — Four Boca Ciega High students were hospitalized Monday after eating drug-laced gummy candies, officials said.
Gulfport police Chief Robert Vincent said presumptive tests showed that the drug was likely THC, the psychoactive ingredient in marijuana.
Pinellas County Schools spokeswoman Lisa Wolf said a student brought the candies to school and passed them around to other students. Seven students ate the candies, she said, and four were taken to Johns Hopkins All Children's Hospital as a precaution.
Wolf said the parents of the students taken to the hospital were notified.
"The school is reviewing the incident to understand what happened" and is working with Gulfport police, she said. Wolf declined to comment on the students' medical conditions, whether any students would be disciplined, or how the school found out about the drugs.
Vincent said the investigation was ongoing and no charges had been filed as of Monday afternoon. He declined to speak in detail about the case.
Boca Ciega High, at 924 58th St S in Gulfport, has an enrollment of 1,720 students.
Dr. Patrick Mularoni, a pediatric emergency physician at Johns Hopkins All Children's, said hospitalizations for children who eat marijuana edibles made to look like candies are on the rise across the country, especially as more states move to legalize recreational marijuana.
"This is, unfortunately, one of the uncommon and unwanted side effects for the legalization of marijuana," he said. "It's something that's happening that we're not used to in the pediatric center."
Mularoni, who said he did not treat any of the students from Boca Ciega, said users cannot be physically harmed or fatally overdose on marijuana, but too much could make a high school student sleepy and unarousable as well as paranoid and anxious.
Unlike smoking marijuana, he said it's difficult to gauge how much THC a user consumes with an edible because, unlike alcohol, there is no test to determine how much marijuana was consumed. He added that it often takes more than one hour for the effects of marijuana to set in and sometimes users have a larger dose because they do not feel the effects immediately.
Mularoni said the edibles consumed by the students most likely were not laced with another drug and likely were imported from states such as Colorado or Washington with recreational dispensaries that sell edibles.
"There's no antidote for marijuana ingestion," he said. "An ER doctor would need to calm the patient's nerves and observe them until the marijuana wore off."
Contact Colleen Wright at cwright@tampabay.com or (727) 893-8643. Follow @Colleen_Wright on Twitter.
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