EU bans claim that water can prevent dehydration

[DCal430]

Read the context above. Then come back and apologise for making an ass of yourself.

I have read the context and you are the one speaking of things you don't understand.

 

[Broheim]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hydronium
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hydroxide

this is where it comes down to semantics, because water is technically only H2O.

 

[Miramonti]

It is now illegal to state that word usage can help eliminate poor sentence structure.

 

[Locut0s]

Don't have a link, but there has been some local press coverage.

Essentially, the ruling is very specific about 1 point. The claim that has been criticized is that "drinking water prevents dehydration during physical exertion and therefore improve performance".

The problem is that the above claim is too vague as it doesn't specify the type or duration of the exertion, or when or how much water is drunk.

The ruling was that this was therefore an illegal claim, as it could be interpreted that you could drink water regularly, then go and run a marathon, and still not be dehydrated at the end.

http://www.efsa.europa.eu/en/efsajournal/doc/1982.pdf

Ok thanks for the link. However this doesn't provide the details about what was actually talked about and what direction the argument took. It's just a dry legal summation of the results, though still useful. In that document it's clear they were arguing over the specific statement:

“regular consumption of significant amounts of water can reduce the
risk of development of dehydration and of concomitant decrease of performance”

which seems to fit what Mark R is saying. If indeed the discussion WAS centred around water as a means of preventing dehydration during physical exertion AND increased performance then I don't think this whole discussion and the ultimate ruling is all that silly. It is indeed var too vague and potentially misleading to state that an athlete, or anyone exerting themselves at that level, can 'improve his performance' by drinking water that one assumes he thinks he has lost during his workouts. You do indeed need to replace electrolytes and in this specific case such a statement is to vague IMHO. What I'm not sure about is if the discussion really did take this form or not?

 

[Eug]

Maybe their main complaint is the part about "regular consumption". Either way, such a declaration doesn't really accomplish much.

I wonder if the bottled water companies can get around it by simply saying their products can help prevent and treat dehydration, and just leave out any references to "regular consumption".

BTW, stick a packet of salt mixture in it and suddenly this bottled water is a medically accepted treatment for dehydration. In fact, that's exactly what they do to prevent or treat dehydration induced by severe diarrhea in kids in some places.

 

[Locut0s]

Maybe their main complaint is the part about "regular consumption". Either way, such a declaration doesn't really accomplish much.

I wonder if the bottled water companies can get around it by simply saying their products can help prevent and treat dehydration, and just leave out any references to "regular consumption".

BTW, stick a packet of salt mixture in it and suddenly this bottled water is a medically accepted treatment for dehydration. In fact, that's exactly what they do to prevent or treat dehydration induced by severe diarrhea in kids in some places.

For the treatment of dehydration due to diarrhea in poor countries they use sugar I believe. It's extremely effective.

 

[PlasmaBomb]

LOL oh wow, massive reading comprehension fail. Of course those diseases aren't caused by dehydration. DEATH from those (completely survivable diseases) is caused by dehydration. All the water in the world won't help in those cases.

Really? I thought that giving someone tainted water to combat the disease caused by tainted water was bound to cure them...

 

[0roo0roo]

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-15806230
eu budget now only 2% increase from 5%

wtf are they smoking.

 

[Eug]

For the treatment of dehydration due to diarrhea in poor countries they use sugar I believe. It's extremely effective.

Sugars and salts actually. If you only used sugars without the salts, you'd run into serious problems (as mentioned elsewhere in this thread).

 

[spidey07]

no, drinking water contains electrolytes (just not nearly enough for the human body), pure water has no ions.

And we don't drink pure water as it I'd bad for us.

Looks like somebody forgot their chemistry lessons.

 

[spidey07]

Maybe their main complaint is the part about "regular consumption". Either way, such a declaration doesn't really accomplish much.

I wonder if the bottled water companies can get around it by simply saying their products can help prevent and treat dehydration, and just leave out any references to "regular consumption".

BTW, stick a packet of salt mixture in it and suddenly this bottled water is a medically accepted treatment for dehydration. In fact, that's exactly what they do to prevent or treat dehydration induced by severe diarrhea in kids in some places.

Or given intravenously. This thread is hilarious. It's like common sense meets stupid europeons vs geeks. It got everything.

 

[Eli]

And we don't drink pure water as it I'd bad for us.

Looks like somebody forgot their chemistry lessons.

Some people do. Distilled water doesn't contain ions. Though of course "consumer grade" distilled water isn't technically 100% ion free, but it's pretty close compared to any "natural" water.

 

[DrPizza]

You are completely wrong. Dehydration doesn't refer to a lack of water, is refers to a LOSS of water, which is always accompanied by a LOSS of electrolytes. This causes the conditions that you described above.

This isn't rocket science - I'm amazed they don't teach this stuff in biology classes in America.

Claiming water doesn't prevent dehydration, based on a handful of situations where it doesn't (dysentery, etc.) is equivalent to claiming that antibiotics can't help fight bacterial infections, because they're infective against MRSA.

 

[spidey07]

Some people do. Distilled water doesn't contain ions. Though of course "consumer grade" distilled water isn't technically 100% ion free, but it's pretty close compared to any "natural" water.

Reefkeeper here. I don't drink pure ro/di water. Bad.

Pure water is oh so happy to make ions. Pure water is bad for you.

 

[Broheim]

And we don't drink pure water as it I'd bad for us.

Looks like somebody forgot their chemistry lessons.

where the hell did I say anything about drinking pure water, I said pure water isn't an electrolyte.

 

[OutHouse]

i swear some of the posters in this thread are the EU commission that made this dumbass ruling.

 

[dainthomas]

Counter article by the Guardian:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/science/the-lay-scientist/2011/nov/18/1

Secondly, dehydration doesn't just mean a lack of water, or 'being thirsty'; electrolytes like sodium are important too.

The obvious answer:

 

[IceBergSLiM]

but can they claim its gluten free?

 

[Regs]

Ok I get the science behind it, but to people who have severe diabeties, for one, need to be told that water is not going help them when they're pissing blood out their kidneys?

 

[Gothgar]

wat

 

[Mark R]

Reefkeeper here. I don't drink pure ro/di water. Bad.

Pure water is oh so happy to make ions. Pure water is bad for you.

Regular water has so few ions in it, from a biological perspective it may as well be pure.

There's no physiological difference between deionized water and regular tap water.