A teenager swallows insecticide for a "challenge" on Tik Tok, a young man convulses after taking a new drug called PTC for "Pete ton cran", a family is poisoned by carbon monoxide: the Paris Poison Control Center "lives to the rhythm of poisonings".
"When something happens, it always ends up calling us: we know that we are a good observatory," Dr. Jerome Langrand, head of the structure, told AFP.
Created in 1959 and housed in the Lariboisiere-Fernand Widal hospital (AP-HP), the capital's poison control center - nine exist in France - responds to emergencies, in conjunction with the emergency services and the fire brigade, in the event of poisoning - domestic or industrial accidents, environmental pollution.
Doctors, pharmacists and nurses specializing in medical toxicology provide 24/7 assistance on 01 40 05 48 48 in the diagnosis and treatment of 40,000 cases of poisoning per year in the Ile-de-France region as well as in Guyana, Guadeloupe, Martinique and Saint-Pierre-et-Miquelon.
"Depending on this and the knowledge we have about the composition of the products, medications, mushrooms, plants or snakes involved, we will give advice on treatment, often at home in simple cases or in hospital for the most serious," he adds.
– “Best” challenges on Tik Tok –
Out of nostalgia, he keeps an old metal cabinet containing hundreds of cardboard cards - now computerized. They list the composition provided by the manufacturer - a legal obligation - of shampoos, detergents, glues or varnishes, which, ingested or applied to the skin, are a source of poisoning.
Recent products intended for consumption are also worrying, such as nicotine sachets or "pouches", which are to be banned soon. "Placed under the gum, they quickly cause a significant amount of nicotine to enter the bloodstream, which gives a "flash" effect," explains the doctor.
"Young people aged 15 to 20 will feel unwell, have cold sweats, a racing heart, low blood pressure, vomiting, nausea and sometimes, more seriously, convulsions, heart rhythm problems", in addition to a possible "nicotine addiction", he explains.
Even more serious, adolescents "convulse after consuming synthetic cannabinoids, 'Buddha Blue' or PTC for 'Break your skull'," continues Dr Langrand.
He also reports numerous "stupid accidents linked to challenges on TikTok" - recently, a "teenage girl filmed herself putting insecticide in her mouth" - or a sharp increase in poisonings with "fraudulent food supplements".
– Alert and inform –
"Through social networks, influencers recommend dietary supplements supposedly containing herbs, natural things, to lose weight, or gain weight," reports the doctor. "In the lab, we find amphetamines, prohibited substances sold by people based outside France." Alerted, the fraud squad takes over to ban these products.
Poison control centers also have the mission of monitoring the toxic effects of household or industrial products (lead, mercury, etc.) to alert and inform the public, to evaluate the adverse effects of medications and to provide consultation on occupational pathologies and environmental health.
The leading cause of accidental toxic death in France, carbon monoxide released by poor combustion in a heating appliance (gas, wood, coal, petrol, fuel oil, etc.) is odourless and can kill in a few minutes: it often keeps poison control centres busy.
"A month ago, a father went fishing with his 10-year-old son: to heat their tent at night, they set up a brazier. The child did not wake up, he was dead. The father did not notice anything, he had no symptoms," relates nurse Edwige Biaou with emotion.
"With the high cost of electricity," she said, "these cases are recurring: firefighters come and find people dead because a charcoal brazier got into the house."
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