7 ms·
US teen died after drinking caffeine too quickly, coroner says
- fb03 9y agoThe article says the teenager had no pre-existent medical (cardiac) condition. Question is : Could it be an undiagnosed, latent condition? The kid was really young and it's not usual to have teenagers do heart check-ups etc.
- d33 9y agoPerhaps they could tell a bit about the history of the heart based on the post-mortem? Just guessing though, I don't know much about medicine.
- sb8244 9y agoIn similar stories I've seen, the stories usually indicates a posthumous diagnosis of some condition. It seems like there was something else going on here that caffeine triggered. That's far outside of the norm for young people though.
- tyingq 9y agoThis story is confusing to me. There are even studies where previous heart failure patients were given acute high doses of caffeine with no adverse effects. http://jamanetwork.com/journals/jamainternalmedicine/article-abstract/2569283 http://jamanetwork.com/journals/jamainternalmedicine/article...
- epmaybe 9y agoI believe the condition was looked at on autopsy, as the coroner gave said report. My problem with this, is that even if you do an autopsy, lots of arrhythmias are not "visible", as they are conduction problems. So what's to say that the teen didn't have something like that, and while there would be no structural defects he could have had a fatal arrhythmia and died.
- tptacek 9y ago"We're not trying to speak out totally against caffeine," Mr Watts said. "We believe people need to pay attention to their caffeine intake and how they do it, just as they do with alcohol or cigarettes." What.
- cmdrfred 9y agoMayo Clinic recommended you do not exceed 400 - 600mg of caffeine a day. It's a drug like anything else.
- KyeRussell 9y agoWhat's not to understand?
- dionidium 9y agoFor starters, alcohol and tobacco are massive killers, two of the biggest known, responsible for millions of deaths worldwide each year (and hundreds of thousands in the U.S. alone). Mentioning coffee alongside these other two is patently ridiculous. https://www.niaaa.nih.gov/alcohol-health/overview-alcohol-consumption/alcohol-facts-and-statistics https://www.niaaa.nih.gov/alcohol-health/overview-alcohol-co... https://www.cdc.gov/tobacco/data_statistics/fact_sheets/fast_facts/ https://www.cdc.gov/tobacco/data_statistics/fact_sheets/fast...
- fivestar 9y agoYes! I can't get over how people can think "smoking bad" but "alcohol ok". Alcohol is a fuel. Do you drink gasoline? "But muh beers..."
- tptacek 9y agoA doctor implying that they're not speaking out "totally" against cigarettes.
- qb45 9y agoHe "wasn't totally against" caffeine, not cigarettes. people need to pay attention to their caffeine intake and how they do it, just as they do with alcohol or cigarettes Note "as they do" as opposed to "as I recommend to do" or anything of this kind. edit: And have a downvote for your know-it-better tell-everyone-what-to-do-with-their-lives attitude. It's not that much effective and creates lots of ill will. Because I think I know what was your problem with this quote and what you would prefer it to be instead.
- Neliquat 9y agoThis is not passing the smell test. I, and many familiars, have greatly exceeded this kids intake. There has to be something else going on here. The media FUD surrounding this is deafening.
- TillE 9y agoA lot of things can be triggers for undiagnosed heart conditions.
- cujo 9y agoHe had 3 caffeinated drinks. Obviously, he had a heart condition, but I'd guess this isn't the first time he'd had that much caffeine in his body. Kid just got dealt a shit hand.
- DamonHD 9y agoIt turned out that "running to the river carrying a boat on your head" triggered my then 18-year-old brother's undiagnosed heart condition. The fact that he was otherwise fit as an ox and his friend knew how to do CPR, meant that after a multiple bypass op he was back riding a bike in a few weeks, and has since turned out fine as a patent lawyer ... oh wait ....
- watty 9y agoI partially agree, seems a bit fishy but then again people OD at various levels. Seems like I read that someone had a 0.9% BAC which would be 2x the amount that would kill most people.
- VLM 9y ago"The media FUD surrounding this is deafening." I wonder how to follow the money on this. It could just be Puritanism.
- staticelf 9y agoPeople have been drinking coffee for ages, if caffeine would be so dangerous wouldn't it be very clear by massive evidence? Me and basically every friend I have exceeded this intake several times.
- nv-vn 9y agoCaffeine is dangerous in a way. It's very addictive and lethal at relatively low doses. Not everyone experiences lethal effects at the same dose: "The LD50 of caffeine in humans is dependent on individual sensitivity, but is estimated to be about 150 to 200 milligrams per kilogram of body mass or roughly 80 to 100 cups of coffee for an average adult." Maybe this teen had some condition before hand/was taking other medicines? I guess if they were very thin that might do it?
- aarongolliver 9y agoTFA says he was neither thin nor had a known preexisting condition. My guess is it's just one of the freak things that happen sometimes. This was a very small amount of caffeine compared to what my average coworker drinks.
- sevensor 9y agoAccording to the article, this young man weighed 90 kilograms. Not exactly tiny.
- deleted 9y ago[deleted]
- Leszek 9y ago> relatively low doses > roughly 80 to 100 cups of coffee You and I have different definitions of "low dose".
- douche 9y agoThat would also be well over the volume of pure water that can also cause death by water intoxication - see the "Hold your Wee for a Wii" incident.
- obstinate 9y agoCaffeine's ld50 is estimated to be 80-100 cups of coffee worth in a single sitting, more if any time is given to eliminate some of it. Seems like the kid just got incredibly unlucky or had some sort of latent sensitivity.
- fabian2k 9y agoThe link to caffeine seems rather tenuous, given the low dose of around 0.5 g mentioned in the article. In another incident someone was given 30 g of caffeine and they survived (https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2017/jan/25/students-caffeine-newcastle-crown-court-northumbria https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2017/jan/25/students-caf...), and the same article mentions a reported death at 18 g of caffeine. I can't really see how the causality is established from the article between the caffeine and the death.
- giarc 9y agoI wonder if the deceased had an underlying, diagnosed heart condition as well.
- karmajunkie 9y agoThe article mentions that he had no preexisting heart condition.
- fivestar 9y agoThe fatal dose of caffeine is fairly low, though. I'm sure it depends on body mass and such, but it's on the order of tens of grams.
- SOLAR_FIELDS 9y agoThe amount is roughly equal to (slightly more) than three 16 fl-oz cans of Red Bull. Certainly enough to give someone hyperactive shakes, but not normally enough to kill someone. Tolerance might play a factor, but I can down two of these cans without too much issue && do so probably once a month or so during a particularly long workday when I haven't had enough sleep. I wonder if dosage time was a factor. Even though the half-life of caffeine is super long my ingestion of ~0.3g typically happens over the course of 4 hours or so.
- sb8244 9y agoA bit of an aside: I cut caffeine out 8 months ago except for the occasional caffeinated coffee or coke. Felt great after the first week, even, and haven't looked back since.
- Eyas 9y agoI genuinely don't follow: "Cut caffeine ... except for the occasional caffeinated coffee" -- what does that leave? Do you mean you just reduced your coffee intake?
- adenadel 9y agoThe OP probably went from 1-3 cups a day to a single beverage once every couple weeks.
- sb8244 9y agoadenadel is correct. I am a coffee snob and will pour over or brew espresso every day. However, I switched out caffeinated coffee for decaf for all of the 6 months and have recently been tempted by some new beans. I'm really into trying different origins and roasters, which makes doing decaf hard over time. I probably do < 1 caffeinated beverage per week on average, and never drip coffee due to the caffeine content. Lately I've been having a bit more as I experiment re-introducing it with L-Theanine. The biggest reason I cut it out initially is a type of heartburn that I couldn't explain the source of. It vanished once I cut caffeine.
- Eyas 9y agoCool. Yeah-- I've had various stints with going with decaf instead, but (somewhat like you) the wider selection always pulled me back.
- diyseguy 9y agoI take regular breaks from caffeine and my quality of life goes way up, but my quality of work goes way down. :) Wish I could live without the stuff
- iambateman 9y agoRandomly, this happened in the county where I live. But more pertinently, this seems like a horrible fluke. One time my dad, a chaplain, was called to a scene where a girl was hit in the chest by a tennis ball and killed. The ball stopped her heart. Crazy accidents happen, but that doesn't mean caffeine is suddenly the silent killer. Very sad though.
- psyc 9y agoExactly. How many times have you heard of a person dying from caffeine? It's very unusual for any given person to have a fatal reaction to some drug. It's not at all unexpected for 1 person out of a billion to have a fatal reaction to some drug.
- deleted 9y ago[deleted]
- astrodust 9y agoDepends on how much of a rockstar you are. Dave Grohl was famously hospitalized for drinking way too much coffee: http://www.nme.com/news/music/them-crooked-vultures-14-1294541 http://www.nme.com/news/music/them-crooked-vultures-14-12945... He had a conversation with his doctor about it that went something like "So how many cups of coffee do you have a day?" and his answer was "How many cups are in a pot? Because I drink like five of those..."
- RealityVoid 9y agoHow does that even happen? Couldn't CPR have helped? I mean, yeah, hitting the heart might make you skip a beat, but causing the heart to stop? Does it even work like that??
- rgbrenner 9y ago"may have consumed about 470mg of caffeine in just under two hours" I find it hard to believe that caused a problem for a 200lb person. I'm 150 and drink more than that every morning and have for years (2/3rds or a full pot, big cup, it's gone pretty quickly--like 1.5 hours). I also pretty regularly will drink 3 or 4 (150mg/ea) venti lattes in a couple of hours. As far as I can tell, I'm still alive.
- ceejayoz 9y agohttps://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Drug_tolerance https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Drug_tolerance
- tantalor 9y agoTolerance generally does not affect the lethality of a drug.
- ceejayoz 9y agoHospice patients on morphine would strongly disagree. http://www.medscape.com/viewarticle/562216_3 http://www.medscape.com/viewarticle/562216_3 > Pharmacokinetic changes occur, for example, if the drug up-regulates the activity of a metabolic process that represents a major pathway for its elimination from the body. Enzyme induction results in a gradual reduction in plasma drug concentration while the daily opioid dose remains unchanged.
- trendia 9y agoThat's not entirely accurate in general. If the tolerance is the result of improved metablosim (as in alcoholism), then it could lead to decreased lethality.
- kerkeslager 9y agoThis isn't even the kind of claim that can be tested scientifically--there are too many different kinds of drugs. And I can think of many drugs where tolerance does affect lethality (opiates, alcohol). Where are you getting this information from?
- Taylor_OD 9y agoI never drank caffeine until college, got hooked on it for the last 5 years or so, just stopped using it last week. I feel great now. If you don't drink coffee for pleasure and only for the caffeine it's worth trying life without it.
- juandazapata 9y agoYou have to stop the caffeine intake for 2 weeks every 2 months, otherwise the adenosine receptors adapt and you won't feel the same effects.
- sevensor 9y agoI find it's worse than that. I still get the nervousness and eyelid twitches, but not the sharper focus. That's when I know it's time to cut back.
- matt_wulfeck 9y agoIs everybody really drinking coffee to become super workers? I think it tastes great and is nice to sip. It provides a distraction from my screen. I don't even know if I'd notice its decaf.
- whicks 9y agoI can't tell if this is sarcasm or not, but I would go so far as to say that a vast majority of people have coffee (or another source of caffeine) in an attempt to boost their productivity.
- matt_wulfeck 9y agoIt wasn't sarcasm. I was surprised that most of the coffee drinkers here were commenting about it in regards to productivity. I actually thought most people were like me and drink it for the flavor, provided distraction, therapeutic feelings it invokes, etc, along with productivity. In fact, sitting my back yard and sipping a nice, warm cup of coffee is just about one of my favorites Saturday rituals, and I have no plans to be productive that day. Coffee is just... pleasant!
- gwbas1c 9y agoI doubt it was purely caffeine. The last time I consumed a small energy drink, I had heart palpitations. Pure caffeine (from No-Doze) doesn't give me heart palpitations; but energy drinks contain more than just caffeine.
- sonabinu 9y agoInteresting how this story suddenly disappeared from the front page of hacker news.
- bluesign 9y agoThe LD50 of caffeine in humans is dependent on individual sensitivity, but is estimated to be about 150 to 200 milligrams per kilogram of body mass or roughly 80 to 100 cups of coffee for an average adult.
- notacoward 9y agoLike many others here, I consume more caffeine than this on a regular basis. I'll bet many of this kid's fellow students do too. Wouldn't be surprised if his parents and the coroner also fit that description. So it's not just the caffeine intake that's involved here. Possible factors: * Latent undiagnosed medical condition or unusual sensitivity * Dehydration or intense exercise * Potentiating effect from some other ingredient, or somethig else he had consumed * Other substances that might have shown up on a proper toxicology scan (mention of which is notably absent from this story) Without addressing these alternate hypotheses, "it was the caffeine" is premature and a bit irresponsible.
- vivekd 9y agoA lot of people are questioning the coroners conclusions because they don't believe that the dose could be harmful. But he makes it clear that the issue is not the dose but the speed at which the drinks were consumed: >"We're not saying that it was the total amount of caffeine in the system, it was just the way that it was ingested over that short period of time, and the chugging of the energy drink at the end was what the issue was with the cardiac arrhythmia." Energy drinks weren't all that popular until recently, we we can expect that we are only now going to see the effects of high levels of caffeine intake on the general population.