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> Worse, if we drink too much water too fast, we can throw off our electrolyte balance and develop hyponatremia—abnormally low levels of sodium in the blood—whi
by carapace 5y ago
> Worse, if we drink too much water too fast, we can throw off our electrolyte balance and develop hyponatremia—abnormally low levels of sodium in the blood—which is just as deadly if not more so than dehydration.
I remember reading a news article about the tragic death of a young girl from this. It was at her birthday party. Her friends got her some MDMA, which she had never tried before, and she freaked out, locked herself in the bathroom, and drank an unbelievable amount of water. Her sodium levels tanked, her brain swelled, and she died.
As a tangent, the news article was titled something like "MDMA kills teen", as if the drug had poisoned her, rather than blaming ignorance and sodium depletion from drinking too much water.
- coremoff 5y agoThis was Leah Betts, I expect https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Death_of_Leah_Betts https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Death_of_Leah_Betts One of the many sources of hysteria around drugs in that period of time, and from the wikipedia it looks like it wasn't just anti-drugs campainers who exploited the situation; alcohol companies fearing competition had a go too...
- marcianx 5y agoThanks for linking. Per the Wikipedia article, the drug was also to blame due to it suppressing her ability to urinate. It also quotes: "If Leah had taken the drug alone, she might well have survived. If she had drunk the amount of water alone, she would have survived."
- bpodgursky 5y agoI mean, if she had taken PCP and jumped off a bridge while trying to fly, I think it's it would be fair to blame PCP and not ignorance about gravity. I think it's pretty fair to blame deaths based on bizarre behavior while on drugs, on the drugs.
- vsef 5y agoBut in this case the idea "drink lots of water" was directly from hysteria about the dangers of that drug at the time, not just random bizarre behavior.