Deadly 'choking game' spreads to Australia
13:00 AEST Tue May 13 2008
By Jay Savage, ninemsn
A dangerous "choking game" has become popular in Australian schoolyards, with children as young as 12 taking turns to asphyxiate each other for thrills.
The game has gained notoriety in the US where it has been blamed for 82 deaths among children since 1995, most recently last month's strangulation of a 12-year-old boy in Colorado.
Now Australian kids are also trying their hand at the dangerous pastime according to teenagers in Queensland, Victoria and New South Wales, who have told ninemsn the practice is widespread.
Former Queensland high-school student Tanya, 19, said groups of up to eight girls would make daily trips to the toilets to press on each other's chests "until they fainted" at her school in Pine Rivers, north of Brisbane.
"It was initiated by the popular, pretty girls," Tanya said. "Some of them were basically addicted. Whoever did it was considered cool."
Source: http://tinyurl.com/57qru9
