Nothing is more terrifying than watching a child play with a latex balloon. For those of you unaware, uninflated and broken balloons are the leading cause of suffocation among young children.
This is probably why those weird balloon kits started showing up at birthday parties - you know, the ones with the straws and the tubes of goo that smelled distinctly like Sharpies.
Some kids would just sit around and smell them. For instance:
That tendency created a huge issue in Canada when some of the kits being sold by foreign third parties were found to be laced with hallucinatory solvents.
And now they've been banned in Canada:
'The safety concern is that blowing the balloons exposes a child to inhaling the vapours of any solvents present,' Health Canada wrote in its advisory. 'If children blow this type of solvent-containing balloon for extended periods, they may experience early symptoms of central nervous system depression or dysfunction, including euphoria, hallucinations, dizziness, and difficulties with coordination of voluntary movements.'
Health Canada says these products 'have been removed from sale online from Amazon.ca,' and that they've contacted foreign third-party sellers. Amazon.ca says 127 units of the affected products were sold in Canada between November 2023 and November 2024.
There were no reported injuries from the products that were sold.
But I bet those 127 birthday parties were lit!
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