Whether we like it or not, eating fast food is an intricate part of an American lifestyle.
Always being on the go, drive-throughs has transformed children’s diets, giving parents options beyond the bagged lunch.
And through the hustle and bustle most of us rarely give it a second thought when we pass our children’s “usual” back to them, but sometimes there is more than you ordered in the kid’s meal.
In Texas, a little boy almost ingested contents that are not anywhere on the food pyramid, giving his mother a startling realization.
Fox News reported:
“Three employees at a Texas Sonic Drive-In were arrested Thursday after an ecstasy pill was found in a kid’s meal given to a 4-year-old boy, police said.”
Thankfully, the boy’s older sister, 11, was opening the hamburger from the kid’s meal for him when she saw something new.
Out of curiosity, she asked her mother if it was candy that she found. The mother looked at the little pill and immediately was alarmed.
The young boy’s parents did the right thing and quickly brought the unidentified pill to the police station for analysis.
At the police station in Taylor, Texas results confirmed that the pill in the kid’s meal was in fact ecstasy.
Ecstasy is a highly addictive chemical that causes hallucinations and sensory alterations. As Drugabuse.com explains:
“Ecstasy is the more common street name for 3,4-methylenedioxymethamphetamine—a highly addictive, illicit drug also known as MDMA, or “Molly.” This drug shares chemical structural similarities with both amphetamine and certain hallucinogens and elicits both stimulant and sensory altering effects”
Originally developed as a medication, the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration banned the drug in 1985, making it a Schedule I drug; which means it has too many bad side-effects without enough good ones.
Ecstasy (MDMA) can have drastic short-term effects according to Drugabuse.com such as:
- Hyperthermia
- Sweating
- Chills
- Raised blood pressure
- Elevated anxiety
- Nausea
- Blurred vision
- Involuntary clenching of the teeth
- Muscle tension
- Tremors
- Fainting
- Seizure
These effects are in addition to the hallucinations and sensory alterations, giving a conglomerate of confusing experiences for a child.
Could you imagine if the boy would have consumed the pill unknowingly, and began feeling sick while seeing things only his imagination could conjure?
How scary for a mother to think of the many different routes that evening could have gone.
You think that ordering food for your children from an established food provider is safe. There are assumptions that you are going to receive the food you asked for, and nothing else.
The police went to the Sonic fast food restaurant that the mother reported she had ordered the kid’s meal from, and they found three culprits responsible for the devastating scenario.
“Tanisha Dancer, 30, Jonathan Roberson, 35, and Jose Molina, 22, were arrested”, according to Fox News.
It was disheartening to discover that Dancer, a key character involved in putting drugs into a small boy’s food, potentially causing him extreme harm, was the manager.
She already had an outstanding warrant for a parole violation in another county, according to Fox News.
When she was arrested, three ecstasy pills were found with her, causing her to face a charge of possession of a controlled substance in addition to the violation charge and the potential charges involving the boy’s food.
The other offender, Roberson, had four outstanding warrants in Travis County, and Molina had possession of marijuana upon his arrest.
Additional charges in relation to putting ecstasy in the kid’s meal are pending upon investigation by the Williamson County District Attorney’s office.
We would like to think that this is an isolated incident. That no one is heartless enough to put an illegal drug into children’s food, but it’s not.
A year ago, two prescription tramadol pills were discovered in a 9-year-olds kid’s meal, resulting in two women being arrested for the atrocity, according to KSLA 12.
It is vital to our children’s health and wellbeing to scrutinize the food they are given by a stranger, that includes food ordered from restaurants.
Unfortunately, it is not safe to assume that everyone working in the food industry has our family’s best interest in mind.
Open up your children’s food wrappers before giving it to them, and even rummage through the items to make sure there is nothing awry with the meal.
Things could have gone much worse if the boy’s sister didn’t find the ecstasy before he took his first bite. Be preventative concerning your children, don’t wait until tragedy strikes to be vigilant.
Please let us know in the comments section if you have ever found something that wasn’t supposed to be in your children’s food.