Experts say vapes laced with spice are being sold to children via social media platforms and are ‘blatantly and pervasively available’, as Amelia Beckett reports.
Warning: There are details in this report that some might find distressing
Vape liquids laced with drugs that put one 12-year-old boy in a coma are being sold over social media sites.
Despite this, Good Morning Britain has found that when the accounts are flagged and removed from those sites, new ones almost immediately pop back up.
Freddie Fenson was 11 years old when he started vaping.
By the age of 12, he says he was influenced by friends to start trying what he thought was a THC vape – the active ingredient in cannabis.
Within a week, he said he was hooked and began smoking them every day. However, instead of THC, it was in fact the highly addictive and dangerous synthetic drug, spice.
Two months later, he collapsed, was rushed to the hospital and placed in an induced coma for two weeks.
“That drug, that took over my life. It took away my money, took over my health,” Freddie said.
“Literally not even like two months of smoking every day, I landed in a coma, and my lung collapsed.”
“I spent two months in hospital, and I had to learn to walk again, to talk again, eat again, literally restart my life as a kid.”
Spice was initially designed to mimic cannabis, but it’s much stronger, highly unpredictable, and significantly more dangerous.
Because its chemical makeup constantly changes, the effects vary widely and can quickly become life-threatening.
Drug dealers often swap out THC for spice without telling the buyer because it is much cheaper and far more addictive.
“Spice for me made me do whatever I could to get it,” Freddie said. “It sounds crazy, but I even stole money from my dad to get it.
“I may have only done that once, but that time I stole was the lowest point I ever went.”
Freddie said he first came across the drug being sold via Snapchat.
“It’s everywhere. I wouldn’t say it’s an epidemic, but I think it could soon be.”
Professor Chris Pudney at the University of Bath has been investigating the prevalence of these vapes in schools and, in 2025, found that as many as one in four confiscated vapes contain spice.
He has since been researching how available it is on social media and has found a network of ten thousand accounts linked to the sale of the drug.
Professor Pudney said: “It’s incredibly, blatantly and pervasively available on these platforms. It’s absolutely overt drug dealing with the social media platforms being used as a shop windows to find as many customers as they possibly can.”
He flagged 74 of these accounts based in the UK to TikTok, but only half were taken down. It wasn’t until his local MP wrote to them that the other half were removed.
However, since then, Good Morning Britain has found a number of new accounts pop up under different names claiming to sell “THC vape liquid”, which Professor Pudney says is in fact almost certainly spice.
“A THC vape would cost around £60 to £80, but these are being sold for as little as £2. That is a major red flag”, he said.
Under the Online Safety Act, Ofcom now regulates TikTok and other social media platforms.
But Professor Pudney feels they aren’t doing enough to tackle this problem.
“Ofcom told us that drug dealing is not one of their priority areas. We’re hopeful with our continued work that can change, but at this point, they are not going to be taking any enforcement action against these platforms,” he said.
“The problem is so blatant and obvious, the evidence is so easy to accumulate that we can’t understand why the regulator wouldn’t at least ask the platforms to sort it out before even doing formal enforcement.”
Freddie said his concern is that until something is done, so many other children could end up like him.
“I feel like the thing for me is the kids that are randomly scrolling, and they end up coming across something like this, and they think ‘what is this, I’ll buy it and try it,'” Freddie said.
“That’s what is scary because then they could end up hooked like I was, so I really want to speak out to try and stop it from happening to other people.”
A spokesperson for Ofcom said: “The sale or promotion of drugs to children is illegal, and platforms like TikTok and Snap must ensure children are protected from it on their platforms.
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“Wherever this falls short, we will take action. Insights from academics like Professor Pudney are crucial to our work in enforcing the Online Safety Act, and we remain open to receiving further evidence on this matter.”
TikTok said: “The trade of illegal products is not permitted on TikTok. We remove 99% of the violating content we find before it’s reported, and share helpful resources when people search for terms related to smoking or vaping.”Snapchat said: “Snapchat prohibits illegal activities, such as unofficial or unlawful vape sales. We proactively detect and remove content relating to illicit drugs and vapes, we employ technology to block related search results; and we provide easy-to-use in-app reporting tools. We also retain content that is removed for an extended period in case of valid police requests.
“Recognising that no single company can eliminate every online threat, we consistently adapt our strategies, work with trusted third parties, and collaborate across industry and society to help keep Snapchatters safe.”
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