With just how tightly-controlled and expensive medical prescriptions are these days, it has resulted in a horrifying number of people being unable to access the mental healthcare that they sorely need.
This has led to thousands of people suffering and unable to live their life to the fullest.
This happens to be an incredibly unfortunate side-effect, seeing as poor mental health affects all aspects of one’s life, including one’s productivity in their workplace.
So when someone randomly dumps entire capsules of medications, you really can’t help but ask why this has happened.
On the 21st of December, Californian park-goers visiting Huntington Beach’s famous city park, Chris Carr Park, were greeted with a very odd sight – birds waddling around sluggishly and unsteadily, as if incredibly drunk.
Some were even witnessed passing out in a comical manner seen only in cartoons, collapsing on their back while sticking both legs straight up in the air.
Here is the problem, however – this is not normal behavior for birds, and these birds were clearly distressed.
The 11-acre city park, Chris Carr Park, is a well-known recreational zone for family outings, and features a lake that not only attracts would-be fishers, but also birds.
As such, birds are a regular sight here, pecking away at the ground for food.
So when an unknown person dumped hundreds of prescription pills onto the grass, the birds had fed on it, likely assuming the colorful pills were grain pellets.
This, as you can tell, was to their detriment.
The birds suffered drug overdoses from ingesting the pills, with at least two of them losing complete muscle control and resulted in them completely passing out in the manner seen in the distributed photos.
The two birds who went completely catatonic and collapsed onto the ground – a gull and a Canada goose – were spotted by a caring passerby, who also noticed the pills.
The passerby had called up the Wetlands & Wildlife Care Center, who took both birds into their care.
These birds immediately underwent treatment, where IV fluids were used to flush the drugs out of their system.
The wild animals have since been recovering and doing well.
According to the center’s wildlife manager, Lisa Perrone, it is likely that these birds would have died from either the overdose or from predators, had they not been rescued.
It is assumed that several other birds have been affected by the pills as well, although they seemed to not have been strongly affected and have been able to fly away safely.
The experts at the wildlife center have identified that the pills scattered across the grass in the park include medications for insomnia, heart conditions, antidepressants, and antianxiety.
While the police are grateful that children have not accidentally mistaken the pills for candy and ate them, no one has managed to figure out the reason behind the pill dump.
Investigation by the police is still ongoing, while the birds have since been released back into the wild.
SEE ALSO: Every Morning Man Walks To Feed Birds. One Day When He Was Late, Birds Stopped All Traffic
