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Australia fell from a highrise balcony planking.

The Kylie Lip Challenge encouraged children to suck a shot glass over their mouths to make their lips swell artificially, in an attempt to replicate reality star Kylie Jenner’s fake lips. Whilst bruising and scarring may seem the only consequence, doctors worried that partaking in the challenge could worsen body image issues and self-esteem. Some eating challenges can be harmful – the Cinnamon Challenge involves swallowing cinnamon – which often makes you cough and choke – and the Hot Pepper Challenge involves eating a hot ghost pepper.

Though most people survive unscathed, there have been reports of kids ending up unwell in hospital.

One of the most well-known challenges of time was the Ice Bucket Challenge, where people filmed themselves having a huge bucket of ice ater poured over them to wareness of Motor ne Disease.

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ly laugh and nag about f the challenges above, unts aren’t so safe… year, a 22-year-old died nvincing his girlfriend t him for a failed be stunt.

t high or faint, kids en found choking their to complete the Passallenge.

ren as young as five d have also posted videos o them partaking in the Tide Pod Challenge, which involves biting into a pod of laundry detergent.

The detergent can very quickly cause chemical burns and kidney and lung problems. Likewise, a teen in Indiana made headlines after his friends poured boiling water on him as part of the Hot Water Challenge, giving him second-degree burns on his head, face and chest.

But the most frightening of them all is nicknamed The Blue Whale Game.

Rumoured to have begun in Russia, an anonymous ‘administrator’ assigns self-harm tasks, like cutting, until the

50th day, when the participant is supposed to commit suicide.

Since the ‘game’ has arrived in the UK, schoolchildren as young as seven years-old have heard about the infamous Blue Whale.

Many children across the globe have been caught photographing themselves on rooftops and cutting their skin into the shape of a whale.

As the sick trend has spread, Instagram has now rolled-out a warning to anyone who searches the tag.

The suicide challenge has already been linked to some 130 deaths in Russia, and earlier this year, the parents of a 16-year old in Georgia, USA, blamed the Blue Whale Game for the death of their daughter. And Russian university student Oleg Kapaev was saved by his parents when planning to throw himself from a building to complete the ninth challenge.

OlegKapaev told Sky News; Under 14s are spending on average 23 hours a week on their phones

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‘I didn’t feel like I needed to kill myself. I felt I needed to complete the task.’

This chase to complete a challenge is fuelling the drive of many susceptible and vulnerable children.

We all know what it’s like growing up and wanting to fit in with friends.

Children are easily manipulated by immense peer pressure from peers and social media online.

How can we protect them from actually harming or

EXPERT ADVIC

Cathy Hassell runs www. teencalm.com – a box for anxious teens and tweens. We asked her how parents can navigate the often-explicable world of viral challenges…

‘The ‘dare’ between children has been around for years,’ Cathy explains. ‘But some of the new wave of viral challenges can be hazardous to your child’s physical and mental health. Teens and tweens who have grown up on YouTube are susceptible to peer pressure, and unfortunately self-harm is likely to be a subject not unfamiliar to them.’

Follow Cathy’s advice to help protect your children…

1. Be there for your child Be available and nonjudgemental. Listen to them. 2. Stay up to date with teen trends Make it your business to know what’s going on both in the wider world and in your neighbourhood so that you don’t get taken by surprise. 3. Don’t be that grown up who dismisses the YouTube world It’s very real and very

killing themselves?

Jen explains: ‘In today’s world, it’s vital that parents are not only fully aware of what’s going on in social media trends, but also have conversations with their children regularly.’

‘We want our children to be aware that things aren’t always ‘real’ on the internet, and to help them be fully clued up and aware before they make their own choices,’ Jen says. As Jen stresses, open conversations and awareness are essential to tackling the wider problem.

Due to the nature of viral challenges, the likelihood is that they’ll never go away. Whilst we can’t stop our children from joining in on the latest, irresistible fad, we can make them aware of the boundary between a fun, harmless risk and an inappropriate, dangerous one.

 If you’re worried about a child and need advice or information, call the NSPCC helplin 00.

important to many children. 4. Gain trust Show you understand the allure of challenges, but try to get a promise that they will take to you about anything dangerous before doing it. 5. Keep in the know Show interest in their friends and find out what they think about the latest challenge – it might help you gauge interest better than talking to your own child. 6. Mental health matters Try to introduce mindfulness into your children’s lives and be aware of how to reduce anxiety which is evergrowing in our schools. A subscription box like Teen Calm will help to introduce activities and items which will help to lower anxiety. 7. Make your own safe challenge Maybe it will even go viral!