A 15 year old has died in Devon, England after suffering from a reaction to an unknown substance, what police described as a ‘legal high,’ in a park.
The girl was found unconscious early Saturday morning with 2 other teenage girls at Bakers Park in Newton Abbot, Devon. She died later after being taken to Torbay Hospital, according to BBC.
The two other girls were also taken to the Torbay District Hospital as a precaution.
Devon and Cornwall police say the substance has not been identified yet and is urging the public for any information relating to the incident.
The police force tweeted on July. 15 “Enquiries are underway following the death of a teenage girl in Newton Abbot in the early hours of this morning.”
A spokesman said they believe the girls had taken some sort of substance which produced an adverse reaction.
“Police currently believe that both girls had taken a new psychoactive substance, more commonly referred to as ‘legal highs’, and had suffered adverse reaction,” the spokesman said.
The death of the teenager comes soon after the government launched a new drug strategy to combat both illegal substances and “legal highs”, performance enhancers, “chemsex” drugs for sexual activity and the misuse of prescription medicines, the Independent reports.
The new strategy will reportedly launch a new intelligence system that can target products which emulate the effects of drugs such as speed and cannabis. This will help them to stay ahead of new deadly drug inventions that can spread quickly into communities.
The investigation is continuing and police urged parents to speak to their children “about the dangers of drugs and (formerly known as) legal highs.”
“They can cause death even if taken just once.”
