The teachers of a nursery school in New Taipei, Taiwan, have been accused of drugging girls and boys by administering them psychiatric drugs that are normally used to manage states of anxiety, to control seizures and as sedatives. The first tests carried out showed in at least eight students traces of phenobarbital and benzodiazepines which were perhaps contained in some cough syrups they had drunk at school: these are drugs which, in addition to creating addiction, can cause respiratory disorders and alter the functioning of the liver and kidneys .
Some measures have been taken against the school, but in Taiwan the story is becoming a national scandal and it is feared that it may not be an isolated case. Nearly a thousand people gathered for Saturday report lack of transparency in police investigations.
The first reports of the alleged administration of drugs to girls and boys in the New Taipei private kindergarten date back to April and May. A man identified as Mike he recounted at the BBC that he noticed that his five-year-old son appeared to be exhibiting withdrawal symptoms during the Lunar New Year holiday break in February. Like him, other families had noticed that their children had become particularly irritable, crying in their sleep and reported having severe leg cramps. Speaking with their parents, the children then said they drank “a potion” at school: in early June, the parents reported the fact again to the police, who then began to investigate.
Thanks to tests on students’ urine, the police have found traces of psychotropic drugs in at least eight of them. One of the teachers He admitted who had given some girls and boys a cough syrup, but defended herself by claiming that the parents had previously consented to the possible administration of medicines to their children: the parents in turn said they had given their permission to give to their children syrups, and not dangerous drugs.
At the moment it is not clear whether the traces of psychotropic drugs are actually attributable to the syrups and the police are doing new tests. Meanwhile, on 12 June the school was closed down and its owners received a fine of 150,000 Taiwan dollars (4,450 euros); the manager and five teachers were arrested, interrogated and then released on bail. A criminal investigation has been opened into the matter.
The families who protested in New Taipei contested the fact that the police intervened only several weeks after the first reports and asked the authorities to provide clearer information. City Mayor Hou Yu-ih, a candidate in Taiwan’s upcoming presidential election, apologized for his handling of the case. In the meantime, traces of psychoactive drugs have also been found in a student from another school. Instead, the health department of the city of Kaohsiung, in southern Taiwan, found that the staff of a doctor’s office had administered phenobarbital to about twenty children: the study was closed for six months and the doctors fined 1.4 million dollars Taiwanese, about 42 thousand euros.