Two Corentyne schoolgirls have fallen ill after two male classmates allegedly threw an unknown substance into their drink and water bottles late last week.
Cynthia Saul, 16, a fourth form student at the Corentyne Comprehensive High School and of Lot 3 Dunrobin, Corentyne, is presently bedridden with intense pain in her stomach, head and tummy.
According to Saul’s mother, Nanda Saul, 40, on Friday she received a message around 3:15 pm informing that there was an “incident at school and me need to go in.”
The woman said she immediately rushed to the school, where she was informed that two boys had thrown something in her daughter’s water bottle and she needed to be taken to a doctor. “So me pick she up same time and carry she to Doctor Narine (a private doctor) and he check she and give she saline and he call fa find out what them mix in the drink. Them say them mix drinking salts,” she recounted.
However, the woman said, after returning home from the doctor on Friday, her daughter was unable to walk and move about without assistance. After the pain in her stomach and tummy increased on Saturday evening, she was rushed to the New Amsterdam Public Hospital. “She start breathe hard and blow and all she face start swell and she crying for pain so me rush she to New Amsterdam Hospital,” Nanda said.
She related that the hospital ordered several tests and the family is awaiting the results to know exactly what happened. “Them give she saline and some tablets and we got to go back to the hospital for the results.”
Cynthia told Stabroek News in the presence of her parents yesterday, that she ate her lunch on Friday and then headed to the school’s information technology lab. She said she left her bottle of water in class and after returning from the lab, she took several sips, after which she started to feel dizzy and complained immediately to the teacher.
She said that the boys immediately confessed to throwing “drinking salts” in her water bottle.
However, her parents said that at this point, they are unsure whether to believe it was only “drinking salts” that was thrown in the bottle of water.
Stabroek News was told that a report was filed at the Whim Police Station and the school has launched an investigation. The family yesterday stressed that they want the boys to be held account-able for their actions by the law. “Them police na even hold them, just question them. We don’t know what will happen, we want them to be charged,” one relative said.
Meanwhile, Stabroek News was told that on Thursday, the two boys also threw an unknown item in another classmate’s drink. That young lady, who is a friend of Cynthia’s, also complained of suffering similar symptoms.
Both teenagers are presently at home recovering but unsure of when they would be able to return to school.
