More than a dozen students at the Francis Scott Key Middle Schools in Montgomery County grew ill and were treated and/or hospitalized around noontime on Friday. The suspected culprit: a toxic combination of alcohol, cold medicine and candy.
Preliminary reports indicate the children drank a home-concocted brew.
“This was not a school activity,” Pete Piringer, spokesman for Montgomery County Fire and Rescue Service, said. “It was, for lack of a better phrase, recreational.”
Authorities also said half-dozen students were taken to a local hospital, and no life-threatening injuries were reported.
In what appears to be an unrelated incident, nearly two dozen students visiting the nation’s capital from Westchester County, New York, fell ill.
Authorities suspect a stomach illness.
Students from Isaac Young Middle School apparently began vomiting Thursday evening, the second day of their three-day visit. The students were taken to a local hospital CBS reported from Westchester, and some of them were treated for dehydration.
The students are due back in Westchester Friday evening.
• Deborah Simmons can be reached at dsimmons@washingtontimes.com.
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