By now, most of us are aware of the dangers of fentanyl. We know how lethal it can be, even in the smallest doses. We were warned about its potential presence in our children’s Halloween baskets. We’ve read of celebrities who’ve succumbed to its effects.
Even though we can comprehend the severity of this drug with our adult minds, children, who have yet to mature and develop, might not have grasped the effects this drug can have on their young bodies. Sadly, a group of young teens in Dalton, Georgia, are learning the truth about the drug’s impact after forcing it onto one of their classmates.
Zach Corona’s sister found him unconscious in the family’s living room.
The 13-year-old boy will never be the same again after ingesting fentanyl through a vape his peers gave him. After he unknowingly smoked the substance on January 1, Zach Corona suffered a stroke and passed out in a recliner in his living room, Unilad reported.
His younger sister Katie discovered him there. The teen would often trick his sister, pretending that he was asleep. When she saw her brother lying there, she assumed he was trying to trick her. She tickled him, as was their pattern, to cause him to move. But this time, when she did it, he had no response.
When Zach Corona arrived at the hospital, he flatlined.
Katie ran and got their mother, Lynda Amos. Initially, she thought he was joking too. But, she says, “when I picked up his arm, it just fell down. That’s when I knew something was wrong.”
Amos called an ambulance. Zach Corona arrived at Children’s Hospital at Erlanger, Tennessee, half an hour later. Minutes after he arrived, he flatlined, according to the Daily Mail. The teen had a stroke and had to be resuscitated. Afterward, he was placed on life support.
Lynda had no idea what happened to her son until doctors cut off his clothes and found a vape pen. Along with marijuana, it was laced with the opioid fentanyl, the Daily Mail reported. The teen was in a coma for two and a half weeks.
My 13-year-old son will never be the same after fentanyl-laced vape. Lynda Amos, who lives in Dalton, said her “straight-A” son Zach Corona, 13, has been brain-damaged after school bullies reportedly forced him to smoke the laced vape.https://t.co/zipyxCjKL3
— Jean Pascal (@jeanpasscall55) April 2, 2023
‘I was feeling hatred,’ Amos said of the children who brought this trouble to her son.
When Zach Corona woke up, he said a group of eight boys and a girl gave him the vape and said they would “beat him up” if he didn’t hide the laced vape pen for them. He believed these children were his friends even though they had been “slapping him in the face” and calling him names for months.
“I was feeling hatred,” Amos said, according to the Daily Mail. “I was angry about who could have done this to him.”
Zach woke up confused by the whole thing because he thought these people were his friends. As a result of the trauma of the betrayal as well as his lingering injuries, the young man is seeing a psychiatrist and counselor. The psychiatrist told him, “You know they were never your friends to begin with. Your friends would never do anything to try and hurt you and kill you,” according to the news outlet.
The teen has had seizures and has lost sight in his eye and movement in his left arm.
Doctors have told Amos that her son will never be the same. He suffered damage to the right side of his brain. He has had seizures and lost sight in his right eye and function in his left arm.
After he woke from the coma, he was taken to Children’s Healthcare of Atlanta, where he began working with speech, psychical, and occupational therapists who have helped him relearn how to speak, count, and walk.
The teen, who was released from the hospital February 21, now uses a wheelchair to get around because of issues with his balance.
‘It was a miracle that my son came back,’ Amos said.
The mother is hopeful about her son’s journey to recovery, although doctors don’t believe he will ever regain full function of his left arm. So far, Amos believes the teen’s progress is a wonder.
“It was a miracle that my son came back. He was dead. My son died,” she said.
Still, Amos can’t help but think about her son’s tormentors. “These kids are out there, running around, living their lives and the way they want to,” she shared, per the Daily Mail. “They don’t have anything wrong with them, meanwhile my son’s fighting for his life. It isn’t right.”