![]() For energy drinks, they’d have to prove that the ingredient in question – caffeine – poses a significant health risk to the consumer. Whether the FDA will decide to change the guidelines for what’s considered a food and what falls into the supplement category is unclear. Among its symptoms, which can start after 250 mg of caffeine, are restlessness, nervousness, gastrointestinal disturbance, insomnia, muscle twitching, “rambling flow of thought and speech,” fast heart rate or arrhythmia, “periods of inexhaustibility,” and “psychomotor agitation.” One must exhibit five of the 12 symptoms in order to be diagnosed. And Caffeine Intoxication is an already-included part of the manual, and one of four disorders having to do with excessive caffeine use. Caffeine Use Disorder is one of the proposed additions to the American Psychiatric Association's DSM-V, which is still in review. There’s no question that we’re drinking more caffeine as a way of life these days, as coffee houses offer 20- and 30-oz cups of coffee. In extremely high doses, as provided by the energy drinks that are now under fire, abdominal pain, vomiting, and tremors, heart attack, and, of course, death are some of the symptoms. For others who are more sensitive to its effects or consume more than four cups of coffee per day, it can lead to fast heart rate (tachycardia), nausea, muscle tremors, and irritability, according to Mayo Clinic. For most people caffeine is not a problem, though it can lead to jitteriness and other mildly unpleasant effects. In an August letter replying to Illinois Senator Richard Durbin’s plea to revamp the energy drink policies, the FDA says that they are in the midst of preparing a final version of their guidelines on the subject, to help both them and the drink makers decide how to market the products.Ĭaffeinated energy drinks can contain anywhere from 160 to 500 mg of caffeine, according to the FDA. The FDA can challenge this choice, and does so on a case-by-case basis, as it has done in the past. ![]() ![]() Part of the problem is that it’s largely up to the company marketing the drink whether they sell it as a conventional food (which would require that they provide Nutrition Facts panel on the packaging) or a nutritional supplement (which only requires a Supplemental Facts panel). Whether these incidents will prompt the FDA to shift their policies on or definition of “supplement” is unclear, but it may be time. Emergency room visits from energy drink consumption have risen 10-fold between the years 20, and now number over 13,000 annually. Parents of one girl who died are suing Monster, claiming that her consumption of the drinks led to the caffeine toxicity responsible for her death (she did have an underlying health condition). The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has received incident reports suggesting that five recent deaths were linked to the consumption of Monster Beverage Corp’s energy drinks.
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