Fentanyl Released Through Air Vents in Child Detention Center Injures Seven

Multiple individuals, including children, were hospitalized on Sunday when fentanyl was released into the ventilation system at a juvenile detention center.

The incident occurred at the Northwest Ohio Juvenile Detention Training and Rehabilitation Center in Stryker, Ohio. At around 8:30 p.m., members of the nearby Williams County Sheriff's Department, Stryker Police Department, and Bryan Fire Department all responded to a call from the center, reporting the multiple juveniles were passing out for unknown reasons, according to Sheriff Jeff Lehman.

Upon inspecting the facility, authorities discovered that fentanyl, a powerful synthetic opioid, had been released its air vents, according to local station WTOL. Seven individuals at the facility were hospitalized—four juvenile residents and three staff members. As of Monday morning, the conditions of the victims are unknown.

The rest of the juvenile residents at the Ohio facility were temporarily transferred to a nearby adult facility while the investigation continues. Lehman said that they will remain there, separated from the adult population, until different arrangements can be made for them.

Newsweek has reached out to the Williams County Sheriff's Department for a comment or update on this story.

Fentanyl, like other opioids, is a drug that is designed to alleviate pain without causing the user to lose consciousness. Amid the ongoing trend of opioid addictions in the U.S., fentanyl, in particular, has gained nationwide attention due to its considerable strength, being roughly 100 times stronger than morphine and 50 times stronger than heroin.

Synthetic opioids account for the majority of drug overdoses in the U.S., with nearly 92,000 users dying in 2020 alone. The proliferation of fentanyl specifically grew considerably in the last decade, with the drug constituting 59 percent of opioid overdoses in 2017, compared with just 14 percent in 2010.

Last month, data collected from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention by the group Families Against Fentanyl found that fentanyl overdoses among teenagers had tripled in the last two years, according to a report from Bloomberg. The report did, however, have incomplete data for 2021 due to a lag inherent in data collection.

In January, police in Hartford, Connecticut, found 100 bags of the drug in the room of a 13-year-old boy who died of an overdose on January 13 while attending the Sports and Medical Sciences Academy. Around 40 small bags of powdered fentanyl were found by police in the gymnasium and various classrooms. Two other students at the academy were found to have been exposed to the substance, but were eventually released from the hospital.