A mother has come forward to share how her son was rushed to the hospital and nearly lost his life an hour after consuming an iced slushy drink. Beth Green and Fred Pegg from Nuneaton, Warwickshire, faced a terrifying situation when their four-year-old son Albie became unresponsive after school on 13 October. The young boy had been bowling with a friend, and both had consumed a strawberry-flavored slushy drink, with Albie appearing ‘happy and excited’ at the bowling alley.
Beth and her son Albie, who doctors said would have died if his parents hadn’t taken him to hospital when they did. Credit: Kennedy News and MediaWithin half an hour, Albie’s mother noticed he was ‘tired and agitated’ in the back of the car. Thinking he may just be hungry, they stopped at McDonald’s, but Albie ‘wouldn’t eat his food’. Concern rose after dropping off his friend at home, as Albie started ‘hallucinating’ and ‘clawing at his face’.”It was a really strange experience. He kept screaming ‘no’ and ‘leave me alone’ in his car seat. He was screaming then going floppy again,” Beth recounted of her son’s behavior.”I thought ‘maybe he has a virus and is agitated’ but he started clawing at himself and couldn’t keep himself awake. He wasn’t responding.”The couple contacted Albie’s grandmother, who advised them to take the four-year-old to A&E. Before reaching the hospital, the boy’s condition worsened.Beth said: “At this point, I don’t even recall if he was breathing. He was a dead weight when I carried him through the door, he was unconscious.”They were shaking, trying to wake him up but he wasn’t responding.”He was taken to the resus room, where he required rescue breaths as he wasn’t breathing on his own and his heartbeat was extremely low. They had to resuscitate him.”
Albie and his dad Fred, who was told his son had suffered from ‘glycerol intolerance’ due to drinking the slushy. Credit: Kennedy News and MediaAt one point, Beth and Fred were unsure if their son would survive the night, but fortunately, he did and spent three days in the hospital before being able to go home. A doctor informed the parents that if they had not gone to the hospital and had returned home, they might have lost their son.In the end, it was determined that Albie had likely experienced glycerol intolerance from consuming the slushy. According to the Food Standard Agency, high levels of exposure to glycerol can lead to shock, hypoglycemia, and loss of consciousness. The FSA introduced new guidelines last year for slushy drinks, recommending that they not be sold to children aged four or younger, though Beth believes this should be raised to the age of 10.Earlier this year, another three-year-old boy named Angus from Port Glasgow also collapsed after drinking a slushy, but he was able to recover after being taken to the hospital. Doctors diagnosed him with glycerol toxicity.
