I Want Candy!

A group of 10 year-olds at a primary school south of Wollongong, New South Wales (about 80 miles south of Sydney) were rushed to hospital yesterday after eating some pills - presumably MDMA - which they thought were "lollies" - candy:

There was no suggestion the tablets were sold to anyone at the school, Chief Inspector Noble said.

"It doesn't appear that people are peddling drugs to school kids [but] we are very concerned about where the student or students obtained the tablets," he said.

"People aren't supposed to have illicit drugs in any case, but ones that do should be careful about where they store them - this girl got them from somewhere."

It was fortunate the children did not suffer more serious health effects from taking the tablets, he said.

NSW Education Department Illawarra spokesman Grahame Kennedy said it was understood the girl brought the substance to the school and shared it with the two boys.

"It's a very unusual and rare event in our schools anywhere but in a primary school it's totally unfamiliar," Mr Kennedy told Southern Cross Broadcasting.

Speaking from personal experience, the dizziness and ill-feeling associated with Australian MDMA is pretty much par for the course. I won't even touch the stuff these days...