Social media has a wide-ranging impact and serves purposes beyond amusement. Individuals typically take part in pranks and challenges that are trending on social networking sites. Trends might range from completely harmless to extremely harmful. Certain challenges have even resulted in death. Teenagers, who are often impulsive and prone to attention-grabbing conduct, may find social media challenges particularly appealing. This time, an 11-year-old child from the UK lost his life due to another harmful trend.
Tommie-Lee Gracie Billington passed away at a friend’s residence on March 2, according to The Times of London. Although local authorities said Billington’s death is yet unexplained, his grandmother allegedly claimed he engaged in the TikTok trend ‘chroming’ during a sleepover, which led to a suspected heart failure.
Yahoo News reports that TikTok has disabled search results for ‘chroming challenge,’ despite the fact that chroming videos seem to have been uploaded there in February and that at least one of them has had over 700,000 views.
This is not the first fatality as a result of this troubling challenge. Earlier, in March 2023, after taking part in the chroming challenge, Australian teenager Esra Haynes suffered a cardiac arrest during a friend’s sleepover.
What is Chroming?
According to the Royal Children’s Hospital in Melbourne, chroming is the inhalation of hazardous chemicals used as recreational drugs. Aerosol cans, paint, permanent markers, hairspray, nail polish remover, lighter fluid, glue, cleaning supplies, nitrous oxide and gasoline are examples of chemical substances that can be toxic.
What is Chroming TikTok Trend About?
The chroming challenge requires the inhalation of hazardous fumes. By providing a quick and temporary high, the toxic act boosts participants’ moods momentarily. Put simply, it has become an increasingly popular way of getting high without actually consuming drugs.
What are chroming’s side effects?
Chroming can cause a variety of side effects, such as euphoria, nausea, vomiting, disorientation, hallucinations, and slurred speech. These early symptoms resemble those of alcohol intoxication and are usually temporary, lasting up to six hours after exposure. Chroming can potentially cause irreversible damage to the brain, heart, lungs, liver, and kidneys as well as a heart attack, convulsions, asphyxia, coma, choking, or even death.
According to a study published in the Journal of Drug and Alcohol Research, long-term inhalant misuse can cause cognitive impairment, such as difficulty concentrating, memory loss, a lower IQ, and poor judgement.
Inhalant misuse might lead to immediate death. A single chroming session can result in “sudden sniffing death syndrome,” per the National Institutes of Health.
What Do Doctors Say About Chroming Trend?
In 2023, Anthony Pizon, MD, a toxicology specialist, told UPMC that chroming is a take on the traditional practice of inhaling various hydrocarbons.
Dr Pizon stated that you can effectively suffocate to death if you aren’t careful, especially while using a bag. Its catastrophic outcomes, which include asphyxiation, suffocation, cardiac arrest, coma, seizures, choking, or suffocating, could have an impact on a person’s health in both the short and long term.
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