The U.S. Health and Human Services Department says that next to multivitamins, energy drinks are the most popular dietary supplement consumed by American teens and young adults.
Energy drinks can provide an energy boost, but at what cost?
KERA’s Sam Baker talked about this with Melissa Mendez, a registered dietitian with Parkland Health.
They have a high amount of caffeine. They have legal stimulants like taurine l-carnitine, which they do increase energy. However, they have been shown to increase blood pressure, your heart rate and heart complications later on in life.
Are they uniformly bad for you?
It depends on how much you drink. I was doing a little bit of research last night, and I saw that a soda has 22 mg of caffeine, where several of the energy drinks that I researched have between 120 to 200 mg.
How harmful is that?
So, adults should be drinking around 400mg of caffeine. That should be the limit if I'm going to drink. Some of us are sensitive to caffeine, so we shouldn't drink any, but the maximum should be 400mg for children and teens. The American Academy of Pediatrics and the Academy of Nutrition recommend that children and teens should not have any caffeine.
Energy drinks are out for children.
Exactly, yes. The interesting thing about energy drinks is the ones from the past that we have known for several decades. Those typically have the caffeine and the sugar. But lately, I've been seeing a trend of having sugar-free energy drinks that are trending right now. So, they can say there is no sugar in this. This is a great option for you to give you energy. But again, it's giving us a lot of caffeine, which teens and children shouldn't be having.
For adults, though, is that amount of caffeine - even in the sugar-free energy drink - harmful?
It's okay for the amount that they have. However, studies have found that too much caffeine can affect the nervous system. It can give us difficulty sleeping. It can lead to hyperactivity for a short amount of time and then it leads to fatigue. I'm tired. I'm reaching for another energy drink. It could give us anxiety. It could increase my blood pressure. My heart starts racing. So there are a lot of negative side effects to it.
Are they addictive?
Yes. And they can also lead to headaches. So, “Oh, man. I'm starting to have a headache. I need another one. I have to get another one.” So, you're constantly going back to these drinks that have a lot of caffeine. And then we get the sugar which starts to affect our weight. It leads to heart disease. It can lead to diabetes later on in life.
So should adults not drink them at all?
It's okay now and then. However, I would prefer having, a healthy snack, and a well-balanced diet to give me the energy that will be long-lasting throughout the day.
Eating what?
When we talk about meals, I always want to have whole grains. But with that, I also want to have a protein. And then we have benefits from fiber in the vegetables. When we're talking about snacks, I always want to have a snack with a carbohydrate and a protein.
I take it they don't give you quite the same high as in the energy drink, right?
However, it does give me the energy to go throughout the day.
Breakfast is important because it gives me the energy for the morning. Lunch will help me in the afternoon, and then dinner will help me in the late afternoon and help me keep my energy throughout the night.
So that's why we always spaced out our meals: breakfast, lunch, and dinner. And then we want snacks in between to hold us over if we need them.
RESOURCES:
The Pros and Cons of Energy Drinks
Energy Drinks
CDC Healthy Schools: The Buzz on Energy Drinks
