A Chinese influencer has been banned from his social media account after posting a video of himself eating a live wasp and causing public outcry over dangerous social media stunts.

Wang Can, who had over 560,000 followers on video-sharing platform Douyin, was banned by the site on Sunday after his wasp-eating video went viral late last week.

He suffered extremely swollen lips and had difficulty swallowing after filming the video on Friday, but claimed it had attracted more than 100,000 viewers and had planned to repeat the stunt again on Sunday evening.

His account was shut down right before he was about to perform again.

In the video with the hashtag “Influencer who performed wasp eating left with sausage lips”, Wang used a pair of chopsticks to catch a wasp and put it in his mouth, after exclaiming: “Although I am a little afraid, I will eat it anyway”.

Soon afterwards his lips and eyes swelled up, but he started eating congee, which he had difficulty swallowing, before going to a hospital for treatment.

A warning caption reading: “Dangerous, don’t imitate”, was added to the video, however, the stunt was also labelled a “courageous” and “fearless” challenge by Wang.

The influencer is well-known in China for his videos of dangerous behaviour such as poking a wasps’ nest without protective clothing.

His videos always start with the expression: “I don’t know what to do after eating,” a Chinese proverb used to rebuke people for doing silly and annoying things.

Wang has become a focus for public criticism for attention-seeking stunts and “revolting taste”.

“This is not funny at all. It could be life-threatening. As a grown-up, he should be responsible for his life and not mislead children,” one Douyin user commented.

Eating strange things has become a popular stunt among Chinese influencers in recent years to drive traffic and monetise their accounts.

A food vlogger known as Tizi was banned from all major Chinese social media platforms in late July after live-streaming herself cooking and eating what local authorities later revealed was a young great white shark, a protected species in China.

Another online celebrity called Yu Ran Zhen Ru is still active on Douyin and has so far attracted more than 5 million likes for videos of her eating various plants uncooked, including kidney beans that can lead to poisoning when eaten raw or undercooked.

This article was first published in South China Morning Post.