U.S. Sen. John Cornyn (R-TX) visited Carrollton earlier this week to participate in a community roundtable on one of the most serious public health crises currently affecting Texans: fentanyl.
As previously reported in The Dallas Express, the small North Texas community has been reeling from a string of almost a dozen student overdoses at the Carrollton-Farmers Branch Independent School District (CFBISD), where at least three children died from taking the deadly drug since last September. Two Plano Independent School District (PISD) students also overdosed earlier this year, one of whom died.
The event was held at R.L. Turner High School on Monday. It was attended by Dallas County District Attorney John Creuzot, CFBISD Superintendent Wendy Eldredge, Plano ISD Superintendent Theresa Williams, and the friends and family of some of the students who overdosed.
“Part of what we’re hoping to do is raise the visibility to others so everybody understands that one pill can kill,” Cornyn said, per WFAA.
The drug is roughly 50 times more potent than heroin and has increasingly been used to lace other drugs like cocaine, methamphetamine, and even prescription pills to make them stronger, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. In the United States, more than 100 people die from fentanyl-related overdoses per day, with many likely unaware they were consuming fentanyl.
“We had heard about the fentanyl. We talked about it with my daughter. We talked about drugs all the time, but her friend convinced her like kids do, through peer pressure, to try Percocet. She took a Percocet, and that was it. She had no idea she was taking fentanyl,” said Ryan Vaughn, whose 16-year-old died from a fentanyl-related overdose earlier this year, NBC 5 reported.
Lilia Astudillo also lost a child to fentanyl. Her 14-year-old son overdosed in January and died.
“My son was more than a statistic. He wasn’t just a number out of the thousands that have died because of this drug. He was a precious soul, a human, who was full of life and dreams,” said Astudillo, according to CBS 11.
