A group of students from El Camino Junior High School ended up at Marian Regional Medical Center the morning of May 8 after reportedly smoking spice, a synthetic cannabinoid, before school.
Maggie White, a spokesperson for Santa Maria-Bonita School District, told the Sun that five students had smoked spice at a student’s home before going to school. The school principal, who regularly stands outside the gates and greets students as they arrive, saw that one of the students was acting strangely, with a noticeable lack of coordination, and the student told the principal that he wanted a drink of water.
“She said there was a water fountain right there,” White said. “The student said ‘No, I’m really thirsty.’”
He was taken to the nurse’s office, where he was soon joined by another student also complaining that he wasn’t feeling well. They told administration officials that they had smoked spice before school.
Two more students were pulled from class and assessed by paramedics. The last of the five had elected to skip school entirely. Another student, anxious at seeing her friends in a state of intoxication, began to hyperventilate and was treated by the school nurse for a panic attack.
Two of the students who said they’d smoked spice were transported to the hospital in an ambulance. One was taken to the hospital by a parent, and the remaining two were cleared at the scene.
Although the school handles most disciplinary and medical issues internally, this is the first case of spice poisoning in multiple individuals in the Santa Maria-Bonita School District that White’s aware of. She didn’t know where the students had purchased the spice or whether it could be bought over the counter in the area.
Synthetic cannabinoids hit the recreational designer-drug market in 2005. They can cause diarrhea, vomiting, nausea, headaches, profuse sweating, muscle tremors, headaches, and insomnia. In some cases, they have been linked to heart attacks and sudden strokes. Acute psychosis has also been described in several cases.
The federal government has attempted, unsuccessfully, to outlaw synthetic versions of scheduled substances. The DEA has scheduled a handful of spice varieties, and California has criminalized its sale and distribution. Atascadero, Morro Bay, Paso Robles, Guadalupe, and Lompoc have passed local ordinances to further criminalize the untested and apparently dangerous class of drugs.
This article appears in May 14-21, 2015.