Recently, a dangerous challenge dubbed ‘sleepy chicken’ made waves on social media. #Sleepychicken encouraged social media users to eat chicken cooked in NyQuil—an over-the-counter medication made by Vicks for cold and flu—or another similar OTC cough medication. Now, the US Food and Drug Administration has issued a warning against it.
This is not the first time that the FDA has had to issue a warning against a social media trend involving an OTC drug. In September 2020, another similar challenge—the ‘Benadryl challenge’—started trending. Benadryl is an antihistamine used to treat allergic symptoms, hay fever and the common cold. The challenge encouraged users to take large doses of the antihistamine to induce hallucinations. The FDA then warned that a higher-than-recommended dose of Benadryl can lead to serious heart problems, seizures, coma, or even death.
There have been OTC drug trends of desi origin, too. In fact, one of the earliest social media trends of 2022 in the Indian virtual space was based on the consumption of Dolo 650. As the Omicron cases rose in the country, Dolo 650 trended as the ‘favourite food’ of the era. Brands like Dabur, Zomato and Myntra then did some newsjacking with hilarious posts that warned social media users to avoid self-prescription of Dolo. “Gentle reminder to not eat Dolo 650 as a snack… you can continue scrolling thenks,” read the Zomato post.