Published: Just now
17-year-old Adam has been using household products as intoxication since he was 12. On social media, the young people advise each other on how to use dry shampoo to get high.
– You are not really aware of what is happening around you, almost as if you lose consciousness, says Adam.
At the same time, experts warn that the trend can be life-threatening.
In several parts of the country, attention is drawn to cases of young people inhaling dry shampoo for the purpose of intoxication. And on social media, young people teach each other how to get the intoxicating effect.
“Is it just to spray in the mouth?”, asks a user on Tiktok. In a comment field, “Adam”, whose real name is something else, recommends a specific brand. “Thank me later,” he writes. For him it started already at the age of 12, when he started getting drunk with deodorant spray.
– I thought that it is such a thing that everyone has at home and then it might not be so dangerous. Afterwards I wanted to try more stuff. It’s like you have a limit, once you cross it you just want to try new things.
no age limit
In addition to deodorant spray and shampoo, Adam has also intoxicated himself with nitrous oxide. Under the bed in his boy’s room, Adam hides empty nitrous oxide tubes. His parents know nothing about it.
– I see no point in telling them, they would surely have been disappointed.
Dry shampoo, nitrous oxide and deodorant spray can all be bought in regular shops, and they are also not illegal or subject to an age limit.
– It’s exactly the same kick you get from the three. First you start laughing a lot and then your ears start ringing. And you get a sense of déjà vu, that I’ve been through this before. You get very lost for a minute and then you need to take more, says Adam.
Four young people to hospital
Earlier this year, the city library in Luleå raised the alarm about the dry shampoo scam.
– A month ago we discovered that it was very messy in some of the public toilets. It was smeared with white powder all over the floor and empty dry shampoo bottles. We had also heard about this from various sources and understood what it was about, library director Mathias Silvder told TT.
In December, four teenagers had to be taken to hospital after a party in Höganäs. They had inhaled dry shampoo and combined it with alcohol and narcotic tablets.
But even though it has been noticed in the media recently, the abuse of dry shampoo is nothing new, young people have been doing it for several years, according to Adam.
– You went into the store with some friends and bought one or two tubes. Then they ran out of them immediately. Sometimes it was a little too much.
“Can make the heart stop”
It is the propellant in the shampoo that affects the brain and gives a feeling of intoxication. But using dry shampoo as an intoxicant can be life-threatening, the Poisons Information Center warns.
– It produces effects on the electrical signals in the heart, it can cause the heart to stop and then you can die. In the long run, it can cause solvent damage to the brain where the fat around the nerve cells breaks down and you get chronic damage, says Erik Lindeman, senior physician at the Poison Information Centre.
Lindeman explains that it is above all the gas in the bottle that is dangerous, but dry shampoo also contains a powder with particles that can get stuck in the small airways and cause lung damage.
“Thinks that it doesn’t happen alone”
– I don’t really think that you should test anything, I know how it can turn out. When I’ve been out with my friends and taken a little too much, then you don’t really become aware of what’s going on around you, it’s like losing consciousness, says Adam.
Do you know it’s dangerous?
– I’ve read a few articles about how things have gone badly for some, but you always think that it doesn’t happen to you alone, that you just have to keep going. Knowing that it is dangerous also creates an atmosphere.