Earlier this week, 10 and 13-year-old children were admitted to Liepāja Regional Hospital with severe head injuries sustained in a fall.
"It seems that young people have found yet another quest on the Internet, where they try to lose consciousness, to enjoy the effect of losing consciousness. As we found out, this happens with strongly forced breathing, which at first increases the oxygen supply to the brain, but then, on the contrary, the blood vessels constrict and the brain is left without oxygen - hypoxia sets in," explained pediatrician Solvita Jegorenko.
Pediatrician Inga Zvirbule expressed concern that this happened in two different schools, so the information is spreading among children. "They are showing each other, they are watching the video, also the two patients did not do it for the first time, they did it repeatedly. When asked about the purpose of all this, it's about four or five seconds of mild dizziness," said Zvirbule.
The consequences of such short-term euphoria can be very dangerous.
"They have had [..] pronounced headache, very severe vomiting, and disorientation in space. They don't understand what they are doing. We had to do a CT scan, tests to conclude what had happened. It is difficult to say what the consequences of this will be because the brain has had some time with oxygen starvation plus the head trauma of falling. Post-traumatic headaches and epilepsy can develop," Jegorenko pointed out the possible risks.
The principal of one of the schools whose pupils were taken to hospital stressed that he would draw the attention of the city's Social Service and Orphan's Court to the need for such children to visit a psychotherapist after being discharged from the hospital.
The classmates of the hospitalized teenager refused to comment on the situation in front of the camera.
