A woman has revealed that she’s worried her daughter’s organs could be “damaged” after accidentally swallowing magnets when following an alleged TikTok trend.
The “trend” sees people use small ball-shaped magnets, placing two in their mouth on either side of their tongue to mimic the look of a tongue piercing.
Kelly Sheldon, 33, said her daughter Tia, 14, forgot to remove the magnets from her mouth before taking a swig of water and swallowing the balls.
“I don’t want any child or mother going through what I have this week,” Sheldon said, explaining that Tia was taken to hospital after she swallowed the magnetic balls.
X-rays revealed that the balls had fused together in Tia’s lower chest area, but doctors were hopeful that they would pass through her system naturally.
“If the two balls separated, and one travels further than the other but finds a connection again while it’s away, it could pull the organs together and squish them,” Sheldon explained.
“And that could easily pierce the intestine or cause a blockage. It’s very frightening.”
Sheldon is now calling for a ban on magnets such as the ones her daughter used. “I don’t think any child of any age should have a magnet. I don’t think there’s any reason for them, I just think it’s a bad idea full stop,” she explained.
Tia had taken part in the trend last Wednesday (12 October) while she was at school.
“This kid had given her these magnets, and because she’s heard or seen this TikTok trend previously, Tia thought she’d try it,” Sheldon said.
“She’d put a silver one on the top of her tongue, and a silver one underneath her tongue, and it clamps to the tongue then and looks like a piercing. She’s been walking from one lesson to the other, and without thinking, she’s had a drink of water, and it’s literally just washed down.
“When the school rang me, I thought she’d swallowed a magnet in a maths or science lesson that morning.So I got to the school as soon as I could, and it was when I got there that I was given these [leftover] magnets and told what happened.”
Sheldon is still unsure whether the magnets have passed through Tia’s body, and said she will “only relax” once she knows they are gone.
The magnet trend first went viral last year which prompted the NHS to call for metal balls to be banned.
At the time the health service said there had been a rise in hospital admissions among older children who had taken part in the trend.
One 11-year-old boy had “serious complications” after swallowing several of the magnets which resulted in a six-hour operation to remove part of his bowel.
When The Independent searched for the term “magnetic tongue piercing” on TikTok, a warning appeared noting that some trends can be dangerous.
A TikTok spokesperson told The Independent: "Our Community Guidelines make clear that we do not tolerate content that promotes dangerous acts that may lead to harm. We have blocked searches associated with these terms. This means if someone attempts to look for this content on our platform, instead of videos they will see a prompt to visit our Safety Centre, which features advice and support we developed with leading youth safety experts."
Additional reporting by SWNS
