The Scar, the latest dangerous TikTok challenge

Another bad idea that has emerged on TikTok. For the past few days, the social network has been full of photos showing teenagers with a gash on their faces. How did they do it? The last TikTok challenge is to pinch your cheek hard to make a bruise appear and thus display a scar.

“I did this last week. At first, it hurts a little and it swells. Then the pain passes, fortunately. I still kept the mark for four days. I told my parents that I had hit myself, otherwise I would have been yelled at, “said Selma, a 4th grade student, to Parisian. Same attempt with another teenager: “I tried too. Luckily, my parents didn’t notice, as my hair hid the mark.”

A dangerous challenge that it is better to avoid, as confirmed by dermatologist Marie Jourdan interviewed by the daily: “If you want to mark your cheek temporarily, the danger for these young people is to get a spider angioma that persists, and therefore to retain aesthetic sequelae”. Indeed, this pressure on the cheek causes blood microcirculation dysfunctions. And the traces can remain on the skin for a long time, warns the dermatologist: “A spider angioma disappears after two years on average, but I regularly treat them with lasers which do not go away. The price of the session can vary between 100 and 200 euros. For the moment, I have not had to deal with cases related to this new trend, but I repeat: the aesthetic risk exists”.