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Students have been known to go on benders, experiment with alcohol, and generally living it up at university.
Most of us have a few nights from that time in our lives that we’d rather forget, or chalk up to a decent (albeit embarrassing) story when reminiscing.
For students at the Vaal University of Technology, however, a night with friends went tragically and horribly wrong.
On Monday, two students died after mixing and drinking alcohol and cough syrup.
Police spokesperson Busisiwe Sango confirmed the incident, adding that the two women were first spotted drinking the mixture at a friend’s place in Vanderbijlpark.
Per IOL, the mixture is known as “lean”.
Police say that the bodies were found covered in vomit. While an investigation into the exact cause of death is still underway, these are the events as Sango believes they played out:
She said later around 7pm, the women went to VUT’s external residence at Froneman street in Vanderbijlpark.
“At that stage they were both smoking hubbly bubbly. Around 7.45 they were showing signs of illness and one of their friends offered them a place to sleep.
“Only one of them slept there. The other student went to another residence which is a street away.”
According to Sango, this correlates with another trend in the “Vaal Triangle” where young people have been mixing cough syrup with cooldrinks, to produce alcohol with “the intention of getting drunk”.
Per EWN on the two deaths from earlier this week:
“Paramedics were called and both students were certified dead. The bodies will be taken for toxicology and postmortem to determine the cause of death,” said police spokesperson Captain Mavela Masondo.
The university has responded to the incident with a statement, having made contact with both families to relay their condolences.
Via News24:
“The university wishes to express its deepest condolences to the families and friends and those who knew both out deceased students very well. The loss of young lives is one too many – our hearts and prayers are with both families and friends.”
These are the first reported deaths as a result of the alcohol/booze mixture in Southern Gauteng, say police.
