What is “Blackout Challenge”, the Viral TikTok Challenge That Caused the Death of Children Worldwide

The “Blackout Challenge” or “Blackout Challenge” is a dangerous challenge that has gone viral on TikTok, which involves holding your breath until you can’t take it anymore and pass out. The exercises are filmed and shared with others. The winner is the one who lasts the longest without breathing or fainting.

Usually, to meet the challenge, they help with household items and there are currently dozens of cases that have proved fatal. As such, it forms part of a trend, along with other challenges, that has been condemned on several occasions for “incitement to suicide” or violence.

This Sunday, Captain Bermudez learned of the death of a 12-year-old girl after completing a challenge. The incident happened last Friday in the city of Santa Fe, in the San Lorenzo department, 15 kilometers north of Rosario.

Unfortunately this extreme practice has claimed the lives of many minors across the world. This was the case of Antonella, a 10-year-old Italian girl who was found dead in January 2021 with a belt around her neck. The little girl’s father declared that he knew his daughter frequented TikTok, but he could never have imagined it. Something like.. “How can you imagine that atrocity?” Antonello Cicomero announced after the fatality.

One of the deaths that shocked the entire world was that of Archie Battersby, a 12-year-old British boy who was court-ordered to withdraw the life support that had kept him alive after he was found in an unconscious state at his home. A rope is tied around his chest and neck.

Similarly, the challenge ended with the death of 10-year-old Nyla Anderson, who was found unconscious in her room in Pennsylvania (USA), and another child in Colorado.

A study prepared by the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) revealed that at least 82 deaths were motivated by the “Blackout Challenge”. Most of the deaths occurred when minors attempted the challenge alone and without the knowledge of their parents.

Other Dangerous Viral Challenges:

• The Blue Whale Challenge: It proposed completing a list of approximately 50 more or less easy and innocent steps, the final challenge of which involved taking one’s own life.

• Devil’s alphabet: involves pricking someone with a sharp object or fingernail while reciting the letters of the alphabet.

• Facebreaker: One person comes up behind another and ties them with a piece of clothing or rope in front of the ankles and pulls them backwards, causing them to fall to the ground.