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Fentanyl was found in a vaping device seized at North Scott High … – Quad-City Times
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A vaping accessory recently confiscated at North Scott High School has tested negative for fentanyl. The vape pen had a weed cartridge loaded in it, and an initial test indicated the item might contain THC and fentanyl. This do it yourself refillable vape cartridge is demonstrated by a vape shop owner.
A vaping accessory recently confiscated at North Scott High School has tested negative for fentanyl. The vape pen had a weed cartridge loaded in it, and an initial test indicated the item might contain THC and fentanyl. A do it yourself refillable vape cartridge is demonstrated as an example at a vape shop.
Todd Smith, owner The Vaporosity Shop, vapes outside his shop Wednesday, Feb. 4, 2021, in Davenport.
Fentanyl was found in a vaping device seized at North Scott High School. Medical and cannabis professionals say dealers are mixing marijuana with fentanyl more often.
Quad-Cities school districts are issuing warnings about the dangers of fentanyl in vaping devices.
The North Scott Community School District advised parents a vaping accessory containing suspected fentanyl was recovered at the district’s high school.
Fentanyl is a synthetic opiate that the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration describes as being 80 to 100 times stronger than morphine. Often combined with other drugs, an overdose can lead to respiratory failure, unresponsiveness and death.
Fentanyl achieved mainstream recognition when counterfeit pain pills, laced with the synthetic opioid, killed Prince in 2016.
The school district said the device, known as a “weed cart,” was seized by the high school administration Thursday. A field test showed it contained THC, the active ingredient in cannabis, and fentanyl.
The device was used but no one overdosed or was hurt by the contents, Joe Stutting, North Scott’s superintendent, said on Monday. It was recovered when several students were caught vaping.
“We will continue to educate our students, work with our families and enforce school policies,” Stutting said of the district’s next steps. “Prior to this situation, we have contracted with a company to install a device in all our bathrooms at the junior high and high school to detect vaping.”
There has been an increase of vaping in schools and Quad-Cities authorities say they have seen an increase in fentanyl in vaping devices, the parental notification said.
The Bettendorf Community School District issued a statement to parents asking them to talk to their children about vaping and its possible risks.
“Our message comes with an added sense of urgency as a dangerous national trend has been identified here in the Quad-Cities area,” the Bettendorf statement reads. “Across the country and in our local community, authorities have discovered an increase in the presence of vaping devices that contain ingredients laced with the potentially fatal drug fentanyl.”
The North Scott release said the weed cart was being tested to confirm the results.
Eldridge Police are investigating, Stutting said. As of Monday afternoon, no other vaping materials containing fentanyl have been recovered by the administration.
The Bettendorf district did not say if fentanyl has ever been discovered in its district. They did not immediately respond for a request for additional information.
Mike Vondran, Davenport Community School District spokesman, said he was not aware of any issues with fentanyl in vaping products in the district.
Fentanyl is a synthetic opiate with very strong pain management ability and has a legitimate medical use, Brian Gustafson, Rock Island County Coroner, said.
“It’s over 100 times more potent than morphine and it kills people when it’s not administered in a hospital setting,” Gustafson said.
Gustafson said the coroner’s office has had a lot of deaths involving fentanyl in general but he has not had a fentanyl-related death where vaping was known to be involved.
Dr. Destinee DeLemos, co-medical director of the Genesis Medical Center, Davenport Emergency Department, said that Genesis sees fentanyl overdoses in general as a huge problem, but one that is really hard to confirm, because the drug tests only test for opiates in general.
“We don’t have a straight fentanyl test,” DeLemos said. “We see multiple opiate overdoses each month, and what we’ve noticed is that these overdoses now are much more resistant to Narcan, which is why we feel the amount of fentanyl in the community is much higher than previously.
“What ends up happening is that a patient will come in with a clear opiate overdose,” DeLemos continued. “Their heart rate is low. They’re not breathing, they’re unresponsive. We give them the medicine Narcan to try to reverse what looks like an opiate overdose. In the case of heroin or percocet, or hydrocodone … overdoses from those types of opiates, you give a dose of Narcan and people generally improve very quickly. But with fentanyl, it takes a much larger dose of Narcan, it takes much longer to reverse the overdose and the patient requires extended monitoring. So when we have to administer large doses of Narcan and see a long length of time to reverse an overdose, it’s a dead giveaway that it’s probably fentanyl.”
Asked if any of the overdoses Genesis doctors see are attributable to fentanyl-laced vaping materials, she said they’ve been seeing a lot of marijuana laced with fentanyl.
“The patient will come in saying I was just smoking marijuana, but then has a clear, opiate overdose component,” she said. “So we suspect that there is quite a bit of marijuana laced with fentanyl.”
Not many of the fentanyl overdoses treated at Genesis have been juveniles, she said.
“It’s mostly adults actually,” DeLemos said. “It’s usually people who already are using street drugs. We’ll see people who thought they bought just meth or marijuana, and then it’s laced with fentanyl.”
Juveniles, however, do use marijuana a lot, she said.
“So with the fentanyl-laced marijuana that we’re seeing, that definitely puts them at higher risk of an overdose,” DeLemos said.
Asked if any of those children had been exposed through use of vaping materials, DeLemos said: “There’s all kinds of materials they can buy at these vape shops locally that are non-narcotic. But they also can do it with marijuana, and that’s where teens can run into trouble if the marijuana contains fentanyl.”
Todd Smith is owner of the Vaporosity Shop, which sells e-cigarettes, the juice that goes in them and other vape-related devices, at two locations in Davenport and one in Rock Island.
He said Monday that the appearance of fentanyl in vape pens has so far been specific to marijuana products, not e-cigarettes.
Illegal drug dealers, not state-sanctioned dispensaries, are the likely suppliers of fentanyl-laced marijuana cartridges, Smith said.
“It’s likely being made by some guy in his basement, using powder or pill form fentanyl for an extra kick to the THC cartridge, but it’s killing people,” he said.
Whoever is lacing marijuana cartridges likely is doing so by creating their own mix of THC and fentanyl and filling empty cartridges they bought online, then packaging them to look like vape pens that are legally purchased at dispensaries, he said.
“Those under 21 who can’t buy legally see the packaging and think it’s legit,” Smith said. “You can buy anything on the internet and, with Chicago so close, there’s an open pipeline to illegal fentanyl.
“I don’t think kids in high school are adding fentanyl to their weed pens. The dealers are adding it.”
At the Cannabis Business Association of Illinois, a marijuana trade organization, another theory is that someone is adding fentanyl to synthesized hemp and/or CBD.
Called hot hemp or weed light, the products are intoxicating but not regulated, said Pam Althoff, executive director of the Cannabis Business Association of Illinois.
“It’s one of the things the legal cannabis industry is warning people about,” she said of the CBD variants. “Any type of inhalable product advertised as intoxicating or ‘buzzing,’ don’t buy it.”
While Smith said he sells one of the “very mild” intoxicating CBD products at his Rock Island shop, he said he carefully vets his suppliers, and their packaging is tamper-proof.
And both Smith and Althoff say they do not think the fentanyl is coming from any legitimate producers of vaping products.
“I’m going to guess 100% they’re buying the empty cartridges online,” Althoff said of the source of the fentanyl, which she guessed is used as a filler in THC and/or CBD cartridges.
The synthesized hemp is more likely the source than THC from cannabis, she said, because hemp is so much cheaper. It is unlikely coming from street-corner drug dealers, she said, and underage buyers more likely are finding it online.
The backstory for the Center for Alcohol and Drug Services “E-Scape the Vape” escape room, an escape room designed to teach people about the dangers of vaping.
Downtown Davenport street scenes at night April 11, 1954. From the archives of the Quad-City Times.
Downtown Davenport street scenes at night April 11, 1954. From the archives of the Quad-City Times.
Downtown Davenport street scenes at night April 11, 1954. From the archives of the Quad-City Times.
Downtown Davenport street scenes at night April 11, 1954. From the archives of the Quad-City Times.
Ripley St. & W. 3rd St., Davenport. (Photo by Times-Democrat)
3rd & Ripley, Davenport. Photo taken May 19, 1956. (Photo by Phil Hutchison/The Daily Times)
Downtown Davenport. Photo taken June 19, 1958.
The Davenport Chamber’s Traffic Committee has recommended that Ripley Street be closed from West 6th Street to the top of the hill. Members say the street is narrow and visibility at the crest is extremely limited. Published Dec. 6, 1970. (Photo by Times-Democrat)
This stretch of trees and bushes along East River Drive in Davenport may fall under the axe to provide a clear view of the Mississippi River. (Photo by Times-Democrat)
The heart of downtown Davenport looking West on 2nd Street during a summer day in the early 1930s.
East Locust Street between Pershing Avenue and Iowa Street, Davenport. On left, Lorenzen Market, 312 E. Locust St.; Guy Drug, 314 E. Locust St.; and Hawkeye Tavern, 328 E. Locust St. (Quad-City Times Archives)
Vale Apartments. (Photo by Phil Hutchison/The Daily Times)
Downtown Davenport. (Photo by Times-Democrat)
Handwritten on back: 3rd looking west from Perry. (Photo by Times-Democrat)
Handwritten on back: 3rd St. looking east from Ripley. (Photo by Times-Democrat)
Handwritten on back: Cutting pole on base. (Photo by Times-Democrat)
East River Drive, Davenport. (Photo by Quad-City Times)
Handwritten on back: Brady St., Davenport. (Photo by Times-Democrat)
Parking Garage, downtown Davenport. (Photo by Times-Democrat)
E. 3rd St. & Pershing Ave. looking east. (Photo by Times-Democrat)
E. 3rd St. & Perry St., Davenport, looking east. (Photo by Times-Democrat)
W. 3rd St. & Western Ave., Davenport, looking east. (Photo by Times-Democrat)
W. 3rd St. & Scott St., Davenport, looking east. (Photo by Quad-City Times)
W. 3rd St. & Ripley St., Davenport, looking east. (Photo by Times-Democrat)
E. 2nd St. & Brady St., Davenport, looking west. Scharff’s Department Store on left. M.L. Parker Company on right. (Photo by Times-Democrat)
E. 3rd St. & Brady St., Davenport, looking east. (Photo by Times-Democrat)
W. 2nd St. & Scott St., Davenport, looking west. (Photo by Times-Democrat)
E. 2nd St. at the Government Bridge, Davenport. (Photo by Times-Democrat)
View of downtown Davenport from the Mississippi River. Former Davenport Bank & Trust Co. tower can be seen in the background and Dillon Fountain. (Photo by Times-Democrat)
East River Drive and Mississippi Avenue, Davenport. (Photo by Quad-City Times)
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A vaping accessory recently confiscated at North Scott High School has tested negative for fentanyl. The vape pen had a weed cartridge loaded in it, and an initial test indicated the item might contain THC and fentanyl. This do it yourself refillable vape cartridge is demonstrated by a vape shop owner.
A vaping accessory recently confiscated at North Scott High School has tested negative for fentanyl. The vape pen had a weed cartridge loaded in it, and an initial test indicated the item might contain THC and fentanyl. A do it yourself refillable vape cartridge is demonstrated as an example at a vape shop.
Todd Smith, owner The Vaporosity Shop, vapes outside his shop Wednesday, Feb. 4, 2021, in Davenport.
Fentanyl was found in a vaping device seized at North Scott High School. Medical and cannabis professionals say dealers are mixing marijuana with fentanyl more often.
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