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Are Energy Drinks Harming Our Children?

Jul
27
2010

When I was a child, way back when bread was a nickel and it was 10 miles to school – uphill both ways – my mother would limit our access to cola beverages and ABSOLUTELY prohibit us from drinking coffee.

Today the world has changed and thanks to some very slick marketing our children are at potential risk to harm from all those eye-catching cans of energy drink you see in every corner store.

Caffeinated energy drinks are a potential danger to children and need stronger scrutiny from government health officials, warns a new editorial in  the Canadian Medical Association Journal.

Mom would say that coffee (Caffeine) would stunt your growth, and while many studies have debunked that notion, a host of other conditions have been linked to overuse of caffeine including impairment of long term memory and learning ability (I bet your thought the opposite eh?), gastric ulcers and hyperactivity.

So how are energy drinks so potentially harmful to children?

Until puberty our kids bodies are constantly developing, putting their hearts, digestive system and central nervous system under great stress simply from the 'growing process'. Add caffeine, a central nervous system stimulant, to the mix and you have the potential for harm!

Now we would never think of letting our 8 year old drop into Timmy's for a double-double on the way to his or her soccer practice. But I am seeing more and more energy drink cans tucked into the top of gym bags!  And the numbers don't lie!

A Timmy's double-double will contain about 135 milligrams of caffeine. That can of energy drink will contain between 165 and 200 milligrams! Compare those numbers to a small container of chocolate milk and a cup of tea at 8 and 50 millgrams respectively.

Energy drinks like Beaver Buzz, Rockstar and Monster may look really cool on the outside, but a 'monster' may be lurking inside waiting to 'buzz' your developing child!

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Sources: Wikipedia, Globe and Mail

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The Teeswater.Ca Team are a group of people interested in providing local news of interest to everyone without needing the instant gratification of their name in (cyber)print.

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This work by Mark W. Law & The Teeswater.Ca Team is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 2.5 Canada.