Multiple Students Hospitalized After Apparent Fentanyl Exposure at School

A 13-year-old boy is in "grave condition" in hospital, alongside two other seventh graders, following apparent fentanyl exposure at a middle school in Connecticut, officials have said.

Sport and Medical Sciences Academy in Hartford was locked down while DEA agents, State police and local officers searched the area, after the teenager reportedly collapsed and fell unconscious in a gymnasium on Thursday.

Several bags containing what appeared, according to an initial analysis, to be fentanyl—the highly addictive and deadly drug—were later found by drug-sniffing dogs.

Initial reports found that a school nurse gave the 13-year-old CPR before Hartford Fire Department personnel took over, a Hartford Fire Department official said.

In a press briefing, Hartford Public Schools Superintendent Leslie Torres-Rodriguez said the student was taken to the Connecticut Children's Medical Center.

Two other students thought to have been exposed were also taken there as a precaution, she said.

It was "believed that the student ingested something in the classroom, Torres-Rodriguez added. A teacher was also hospitalized after suffering a panic attack.

According to NBC Connecticut, students and staff were asked to walk through a solution of bleach and OxyClean to decontaminate their shoes before being allowed to leave on Thursday afternoon.

The school was, at the time of writing, yet to clarify whether classes would resume on Friday.

Hartford Mayor Luke Bronin pleaded with parents to warn their children about the dangers of taking unknown substances.

"Our entire community is praying for this child in the hospital and for his family," he told reporters on Thursday.

"And again [I] make an ask of every parent to talk with your kids and make sure they know how serious and how dangerous any unknown substance can be and any drug can be."

"Please have that conversation tonight," he added. "We're talking about seventh graders. It's never too early to have that conversation."

Fentanyl, a synthetic opioid, is approximately 50 times more potent than heroin, and about 100 times more potent than morphine. A dose of just 2-milligrams can be fatal.

The DEA said in its 2020 National Drug Threat Assessment report that China is the "main source for all fentanyl-related substances trafficked into the United States."

Border officials seized a total of 11,200 pounds of the substance between September 2020 and September 2021—up from 2,150 pounds on the previous year.

"This is one more lesson that fentanyl is a poison, these drugs are a poison. Please, if you are a parent, have that tough conversation with your child tonight.

"If anyone offers, suggests, that they experiment with, ingest some substance that they think is a drug, they don't know what it is, don't do it, stay a mile away, and for God's sake, please report it so we can try to protect your child, their friends, everything," Mayor Bronin added.