First, don't eat Tide Pods. They're actually poisonous for you. Profuse vomiting, seizures, difficulty breathing and coma — this is what awaits you if you ingest the detergent. So, don't.
It's been called the first meme of 2018. If you are a parent who has not heard of it yet, it's more familiarly known as the "Tide Pod Challenge" and parents groups and health organizations across North America advise young people to beware.
In case you missed it, the Tide Pod Challenge is a social media and online phenomenon in which someone — most often a teenager — films themselves biting into a Tide Pod, you know those colourful little clear squares filled with liquid detergent that dissolve in the wash.
It broke into the mainstream this month, but online fact-checker Snopes.com traced the concept of eating detergent pods back to 2012, with videos of people ingesting various types of detergent back to 2011.
Last week, on Jan. 18, both Google and Facebook said they were removing all Tide Pod Challenge videos from their platforms to help discourage imitators. Google owns YouTube.
It should go without saying that cleaning products are not food, but, much like the Ice Bucket Challenge that swept across the continent a couple of years ago, the desire to participate in a popular meme can be significant. You can show off to your friends, and get some online notoriety, too.
And again much like the Ice Bucket Challenge, which led to a few injuries (nothing terribly serious and no deaths, despite the rumours), the Tide Pod Challenge could have unintended consequences as well.
The product contains concentrated detergent, after all, which, obviously, is not meant for human consumption. The challenge isn't to eat the pod, though, but to bite into it so the chemical soup therein flows out. Accidental ingestion is, of course, possible, and potentially harmful.
The Ontario Poison Centre has received upwards of 2,000 calls related to single-use laundry detergent exposure over the past five years since the products were introduced, but has only noticed a slight uptick in calls since the beginning of the year when the Tide Pod Challenge really took off.
Snopes reported that the American Association of Poison Control Centers had received 40 exposure reports for liquid laundry detergent by 13- to 19-year-olds in the first 11 days of 2018, which represents about 20 per cent of the total number of similar incidents in 2017. As of Monday, that number had climbed from 40 to 86.
This suggests the meme is having a real-world effect. That said, there have been no reports that Sudbury.com could find confirming any deaths, but kids are being sickened.
The potential for harm is such Public Health Sudbury and Districts (formerly called the Sudbury and District Health Unit) warns parents to be on the look out and kids to be aware of the danger.
"Teens are challenging each other on social media to put a Tide Pod cleaning detergent in their mouths," said Sylvie Patenaude-Renaud, a public health nurse. "That causes concern for us as it can become a significant health risk."
While she calls the social media challenge "a teachable moment", Patenaude-Renaud also urges parents to "be prepared to listen and ask teens what their perspectives are."
On that note, Sudbury.com decided to ask some Grade 11 students from Lo-Ellen Secondary School to weigh in on the Tide Pod Challenge. They, like most people, think the trend is pretty ... well, dumb. But they also said they know of kids in Greater Sudbury who have taken the Tide Pod Challenge.
One student, Lexi High, admitted that she had not heard about the social media trend until very recently. "My immediate response was, 'Why would someone do that?' Not even a day later my friend sent me a video of someone at Lockerby doing this challenge," Lexi said.
"I think it started out as a joke or someone being silly on social media, but over time ... it has just been blown out of proportion. I think it has morphed to being more of a threat rather than a joke."
Emily Cooke agrees that the phenomena likely "began as something funny for people to see on social media when it was first introduced, but since it has been taken out of proportion and has become a dangerous trend."
"If you see it all over your social media feeds, it can influence you to take part in the 'challenge' that many others are taking part in," Emily said. "Most people that participate in these challenges do so because of the fun look of it and in order to follow the social norm to fit in with the trend."
Malek Abou-Rabia didn't pull any punches when asked for his opinion.
"Ridiculous, irresponsible and down-right stupid," he said. In his opinion, this behaviour "comes from a couple sources. One of them would be this 'meme' culture and the dark humour that younger generations have along with the need to create new content to become trendy in any way they can."
Public Health Sudbury and Districts would like to remind the public that detergents shouldn't be put into the mouth (or any orifice for that matter) and should never be ingested. The chemicals are toxic. Known potential effects include profuse vomiting, seizures, difficulty breathing and coma.
If you suspect that someone may have ingested laundry detergent, call Ontario Poison Control immediately at 1-800-268-9017. If they are having difficulty breathing or are unconscious call 911.
