In China, where Internet cafes buzz all night long with eager gamers, one man died of extreme exhaustion after spending 72-hours playing without break, reports an
Associated Press article.
While reports fail to mention what exactly the man was playing, it is likely that he was deeply involved in a massively multi-player online role-playing game. The games are very popular with Chinese youth.
"According to preliminary findings, the length of time this man spent online might have triggered heart problems,"
PC World reports Beijing News as saying.
A
Telegraph report states that China “has one of the world's biggest markets for online games, with tens of millions of players, many of whom play in the country's ever-expanding network of web cafes.”
This incident is not the first of its type to have occurred recently. Last March, a 26 year-old man died of a heart attack after spending seven days in front of his computer, “leaving it only for toilet breaks and to snatch a few hours sleep on the bed next to it,” explains
another Telegraph article.
China has been struggling to put a damper on what it call “Internet addiction”. A low level of this sort of addiction is believed to exist in more than 10% of Shanghai youngsters, explains a
China Economic Review report.
For the first time this year, China launched a 10-day summer camp dedicated to helping 40 young Internet addicts, ages 14 to 22. The project hopes to develop an intervention process, then use it in schools, families and communities, explains a
China View article.
