The Food and Drug Administration has issued a warning about TikTok’s “Benadryl Challenge” after getting reports of teens risking — and in one case, losing — their lives over the viral stunt.
“Taking higher than recommended doses of the common over-the-counter (OTC) allergy medicine diphenhydramine (Benadryl) can lead to serious heart problems, seizures, coma or even death,” the advisory said. “We are aware of news reports of teenagers ending up in emergency rooms or dying after participating in the ‘Benadryl Challenge’ encouraged in videos posted on the social media application TikTok.”
The FDA said it is “investigating these reports and conducting a review to determine if additional cases have been reported,” and “strongly urged” TikTok to remove videos of the challenge.
“Health care professionals should be aware that the ‘Benadryl Challenge’ is occurring among teens and alert their caregivers about it,” the agency added.
Earlier this month, pharmaceutical giant Johnson & Johnson also warned parents of the perils of the viral stunt.
“The Benadryl TikTok trend is extremely concerning, dangerous and should be stopped immediately,” a company spokesperson said in a statement.
The challenge, which involves taking enough Benadryl to hallucinate and posting the footage on the video-sharing platform, was blamed for the death of a 15-year-old Oklahoma girl last month, local news station KFOR reported. According to the broadcast, the faith-driven teen was happy and “not one to experiment with drugs.”
The challenge has also resulted in the hospitalizations of at least three young people in Fort Worth, Texas, in May, KFOR reported.
Johnson & Johnson also announced it is working with TikTok to implement “the removal of content across social platforms that showcase this behavior.”
TikTok has become a hotbed of hazardous challenges. Among the most recent were the flammable penny fad and the “skull-breaker” challenge, which has also been deemed deadly by doctors.
Doesn’t matter what the challenge is tied to (these fads are not new), the consistent factor is their sheer stupidity, and all too consistent disregard for those foolish enough to take them up. Being “in” is NEVER worth your health or life, and most people forget they are others’ “somebody else” to whom the bad stuff will happen!
With havin so much content and articles do you ever run into any problems of plagorism or copyright violation? My
site has a lot of exclusive content I’ve either written myself or outsourced but
it looks like a lot of it is popping it up all over the internet without my authorization. Do you know any ways to help prevent content from being ripped off?
I’d truly appreciate it.