2 die from social media drinking game – #StopNekNominations

#Neknominate, the drinking game taking the whole world by storm thanks to social media has already claimed its first 2 victims in Ireland.

22-year-old Ross Cummins was found unconscious in the early hours of Saturday morning in a house in Dublin. Cummins had been filmed doing a #neknominate on his Facebook page and the Irish media are blaming the social media drinking game for his death.

19-year-old Johnny Byrne jumped into a river in County Carlow after dowing a beer and his body was found on Sunday morning. The police are investigating wether his death is linked to the internet craze.

Byrne’s brother Patrick posted the following plea to his Facebook page:

 “Everyone across the world please like and share,” he wrote in a Facebook post.

“This neck nomination shit HAS TO STOP RIGHT NOW my young 19 year old brother Jonny Byrne from Carlow died tonight in the middle of his nomination. He thought he had to try and beat the competition and after he necked his pint he jumped into the river. After 5 hours of searching he is still not found. If people have any decency and respect they will refrain from any more of this stupid neck nomination shit.”

The Facebook page dedicated to this craze has over 30 000 likes with various other pages popping up and people posting their own #neknominations to their own and their friend’s pages.

Rather use it for good

South African Brent Lindeque has got another idea to turn the social media game around and get people to rather do something good and nominate good deeds instead. We’re with Brent.