ORLANDO, Fla. — As the fentanyl crisis continues across America because of the rise in laced street drugs, efforts in Central Florida to curb the deadly impact have become limited due to the increase in access to naloxone, which helps prevent overdose deaths. 

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According to the Drug Enforcement Administration, 42% of pills tested for fentanyl contain a deadly amount.

One Central Florida teen is not only lucky to be alive, but trying to learn just how to say a single word once again.

Angel Pagan, 18, became addicted to Percocet at 16-years-old following back surgery. However, the addiction to the pain medication is not what put him the state he is today.

Before October of last year, he was active, strong, and able to do things on his own. Now he’s bound to a wheelchair, learning to communicate, and trying to build his muscles back up.

Everything changed when Angel thought he was buying a Percocet from someone one night at a hookah lounge with his friend. However, the Percocet he purchased was laced with fentanyl.

“He went in to cardiac arrest. His friend called 911,” Angel’s mother Alexis Rodriguez explained. “Then Angel suffered an anoxic brain injury due to a lack of oxygen.”

EMTs used four doses of NARCAN on Angel but were unsuccessful. It took two attempts to resuscitate his heart. He was then in a coma for nearly a month.   

“A lot of people, I don’t think, truly understand that this can be a part of an overdose,” Alexis said, referring to her son’s current state.

Angel’s new normal includes an hour of speech therapy, where he continues to put just a simple word together. He’s also in physical therapy, where he works on strengthening his muscles with Dr. Brittany Dedaj, who has been working with patients like Angel for the past five years. She says the effects of drugs laced with fentanyl continue to be getting worse.

“I didn’t realize the extent that it would have on the brain,” Dr. Dedaj said. “The overdoses, it’s leading to anoxic brain injuries, and how it affects their everyday function, their independence — I didn’t predict.”

Alexis said she is lucky her son is alive. According to a study by the University of California Los Angeles, an average of 22 teens from the ages of 14-18 died in the U.S. each week in 2022 from drug overdoses. That’s roughly five for every 100,000 driven by fentanyl found in counterfeit pills. 

Because of Angel’s coma from the laced Percocet, his mother had to quit her job to be by his side and the family has accrued hundreds of thousands of dollars in medical bills as Angel continues to rehab and get stronger.