It’s a recipe for disaster — and possibly the hospital.
The US Food and Drug Administration is warning against a social media challenge which involves people coating their poultry in NyQuil.
Called the “NyQuil Chicken Challenge,” users on social media are covering their meat in the over-the-counter medication, which is used to treat flu symptoms, colds and allergies.
Unsurprisingly, the FDA warned it could have very dangerous outcomes — not just if it’s ingested but from the cooking process.
“Boiling a medication can make it much more concentrated and change its properties in other ways,” the FDA explained in a warning, adding that even inhaling the medication’s vapors while cooking could cause high levels of the drugs to enter your body.
“It could also hurt your lungs,” the warning continued. “Put simply: Someone could take a dangerously high amount of the cough and cold medicine without even realizing it.”
It’s unclear why the FDA only now issued the warning about the challenge, since videos have been circulating online for months. In the clips, people cook a chicken breast and pour large amounts of the liquid medication — which contains acetaminophen, dextromethorphan HBr and doxylamine succinate — into the pan, coating and submerging the meat in it.
The FDA noted the social media trend relied on “peer pressure” with “online video clips of people misusing nonprescription medications and encouraging viewers to do so too.”
Overdosing on NyQuil can cause symptoms such as seizures, severe dizziness, liver problems and breathing problems, just to name a few and can be potentially fatal.
The challenge is similar to other challenges that have circulated online, including an earlier TikTok challenge called “sleepy chicken.” Another trend called the “Benadryl Challenge” urged people to take large doses of the allergy medicine containing diphenhydramine to try to induce hallucinations, the FDA said.
Dr. Aaron Hartman, a physician and assistant clinical professor of family medicine at Virginia Commonwealth University, explained why the trend is dangerous — and potentially fatal.
“If you ate one of those cutlets completely cooked, it’d be as if you’re actually consuming a quarter to half a bottle of NyQuil,” he previously told MIC.com.
“When you cook cough medicine like NyQuil, you boil off the water and alcohol in it, leaving the chicken saturated with a super-concentrated amount of drugs in the meat.”
The usual recommended dosage of liquid NyQuil is:
- Children ages less than 6 years: Not recommended, do not give Nyquil to a child under 6 years
- Children ages 6 to 11 years: 15 milliliters every 6 hours if needed.
- Teenagers ages 12 years or older: 30 milliliters every 6 hours if needed
- Adults: 30 milliliters every 6 hours if needed
