Wednesday 3 August 2022 10:34 PM As Archie Battersbee's mother fights to save him - why can't Tiktok block all ... trends now

The twin circles of deep purple on the back of each of her daughter’s hands appeared almost innocuous at first. Tori Barber thought her bright, outgoing ten-year-old must have been drawing on her hands with a pen. 

In fact, though, the patches of darkened flesh were a type of burn, caused when Tori’s daughter sprayed an aerosol deodorant with the nozzle right up against her skin to create a freezing sensation. The result is akin to frostbite. 

The purple circles were just the start. Within 24 hours the schoolgirl was in hospital in excruciating pain, and doctors were warning that skin grafts might be needed to tackle the blistering burns. 

So what on earth had possessed her to do this? The answer: a ‘fun’ challenge some children in her class had seen on the video-sharing platform TikTok. She and her friend had tried it during a sleepover. 

Only after five weeks was she finally discharged from the care of hospital burns specialists. When she shared photographs of the wounds with other parents on Facebook, Tori said: ‘All this for seconds of silliness. This was a trend someone had seen on TikTok and my daughter wanted to see how it felt. She didn’t realise it would turn out this way.’ 

TikTok has taken the social media world by storm since its global launch in 2017, allowing users to share short bursts of content that range from innocent dance routines to perilous challenges.

There is no more poignant and terrifying example of what can happen than the case of 12-year-old Archie Battersbee, who was declared brain dead after collapsing at home and has been the subject of a fierce legal battle over whether to switch off his life support. 

His mother Hollie believes her son may have been trying the so - called ‘blackout’ challenge shortly before he was found unconscious. This insanely dangerous online craze encourages users to choke themselves until they reach the point of losing consciousness. When Archie’s mother found him, the budding gymnast had a cord wrapped around his neck. 

TikTok says this was never a trend on its platform and it ‘removes any contact that promotes dangerous behaviour that could cause harm’. 

This week, Archie’s parents lost their Supreme Court attempt to stop doctors withdrawing his life support, and yesterday the European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) refused an application to postpone the withdrawal of his treatment. 

Archie’s case is not an isolated one. Last month, a lawsuit was brought against TikTok by the families of two young girls in the U.S. who claim the hosting service’s ‘dangerous’ algorithms were to blame for their children’s deaths. 

The two girls, aged eight and nine, died of strangulation last year after trying the same challenge, which has been growing in popularity across social media in the past year. It has also has been linked to the deaths of at least five other children aged ten to 14 in Italy, Australia and the U.S. 

Other ‘challenges’ on TikTok beggar belief.

In the socket challenge, a phone charger is partially pulled out of a socket and a penny is dropped on the exposed prongs, leading to a shower of sparks. 

In the salt-and-ice challenge, participants pour salt on their skin, then cover it in ice, leading to second-degree burns and frostbite. 

The nutmeg challenge involves consuming ground nutmeg, leading to a ‘high’ plus side-effects that may include a raised heart rate, breathing difficulties and, in some cases, seizures. The Benadryl challenge, in which many times the safe dose of antihistamines are consumed, can cause seizures and cardiac arrest. 

The list goes on. 

In Hertfordshire, Tori Barber is grateful that her daughter is recovering from her injuries. ‘She doesn’t even have TikTok,’ says the mother of three, who is desperate to ensure no other child or parent has to go through what her family have done. 

‘She had just heard about this challenge at school, was staying with a friend and they were like, “let’s give it a try”.’ 

" title="YouTube video player" frameborder="0"

Although the ‘challenge’ itself predates social media, awareness of it has been amplified by the explosion in video-sharing, particularly on sites such as YouTube and TikTok. 

‘I was speechless when I realised what she had done,’ says Tori. ‘There was a tiny mark on her forearm where she first tried it. 

‘I said: “What were you thinking? You did it once, why do it again? She said she wanted to see how cold she could cope with. 

‘When she went to hospital last week, the nurse said that in 20 years she had never seen anything like it — but that three or four people had done it recently.’ 

Jane Platt’s daughter Sarah has been left with lasting health problems after another challenge that had been doing the rounds on TikTok went wrong. 

Sarah, 15, was rushed to hospital in February 2020 after being persuaded to take part in the ‘skullbreaker challenge’, which is as lunatic as it sounds. It involves two perpetrators kicking a victim’s legs from under them as they jump in the air, causing them to land flat on their back on the ground, banging their head. 

Perhaps it’s not surprising that the moment Sarah’s attempt at the challenge went dangerously wrong was captured on camera. A very reluctant participant, one moment the bright, sporting teenager is bouncing up and down between two hockey teammates on the pitch. The next her legs are knocked from under her and she lands on her upper back and neck, breaking several small bones. 

When Jane, 57, received a call from the team coach telling her Sarah was on her way to hospital, she assumed it was a sports-related injury. ‘I was thinking she’d been hit with a stick or a ball,’ she says.

read more from dailymail.....