As Halloween came around the corner, a looming fear plagued parents’ minds: drugs, including Fentanyl and THC, often referred to as medical cannabis, being laced in door-to-door candy hauls. Each year, parents and kids alike are warned about the possibility of drugs being marketed to children, this time in the form of colorful tablets (or rainbow fentanyl), allegedly intended to entice children into taking the drug.
The paranoia first started on September 29, 1982, when Mary Kellerman woke up with a fever and a runny nose. Just as she took some Tylenol to ease her sickness, she collapsed in the bathroom. Rushed to the hospital by her anxious parents, she was found dead due to sudden, unknown circumstances, at the young age of twelve. But soon, investigations revealed that a chain of mysterious fatalities in the Chicago Area, similar to Mary’s, were linked to the tampering of Tylenol bottles with cyanide. The “Tylenol Murders” rocked the nation and stoked public fear of drugged products.
Unfortunately, the murders conspired right before Halloween, sparking fear about drug tampering for years to come.
The first reported case of drug lacing in Halloween candy involved William Shyne, a local dentist. Along with lollipops, over 400 laxative pills were found in children's trick-or-treat baskets. This case prolonged decades of delusions on top of previously held fears. Over the years, more cases were reported. Two children separately found razor blades located inside their chocolate bars. Although no significant injuries were reported, razor blades became an added fear among the ones already piling up. These occurrences suggested isolated cases of contaminated candy rather than a repeated cycle. Nevertheless, despite the isolation of each incidence, the media dramatized the possible risks, ultimately affecting parents’ perceptions of such risks.
Since there are no reliable methods for verifying the origins of candy, nervous parents become extra cautious during the consumption of sweet treats and create procedures of their own, like going through their children's candy baskets.
However, these actions lead to the question: is there really a possibility of my candy being poisoned? The answer is probably not. So far, very few recorded cases of tampered Halloween candy have been recorded. Although we often hear stories, actual cases of candy tampering are rare. The unexciting reality is that no one wants to drug children with expensive candy drugs that they could sell to others for profit. Handing out free and lethal doses of these drugs to young, unsuspecting children results in a little gain for the perpetrators.
Trick-or-treaters have been plagued by the widespread conspiracy theory that candy is contaminated and will forever more. Intrigued by the seemingly widespread effects of drug lacing, we decided to test this theory out for scientific purposes. Knocking on the door of our neighbors’ houses, we procured a large assortment of candy. The malicious old woman giving out candy to the children roaming around in their costumes handed us Butterfingers, KitKats, and Sour Patch. We examined the candy for drugs after bringing it back to our lab. The results showed no evidence of tampering. The candy was not laced with fentanyl.
Or was it?