Police: 7 children hospitalized after given sleeping pills

HOPEWELL, Va. (AP) — A house full of unsupervised children in Virginia were given sleeping pills by another child, causing them to be hospitalized Wednesday evening (March 23, 2022), police said. WTVR-TV reports that Hopewell Police were called to a home on South 16th Street around 5:30 p.m. where they found four children, ages 1 to 4, unresponsive. Three more children found in another part of the home were awake but lethargic. Their ages were not immediately known. Lt. Cheyenne Casale of the Hopewell Police Department said that the kids were left alone for a short period of time and that one of the kids who had prescription medication “got into it and shared with the other children here.” It was not immediately clear if the medication was prescribed to the 7-year-old child.