Can Sparkling Water Unsparkle Your Life?

We're often told that drinking sparkling water is bad for our gut, bones, and teeth. Is this, however, accurate? We've all heard that consuming sugary, fizzy drinks all day isn't a good idea. The high sugar content combined with the acidity caused by the carbonation that makes it effervescent is undesirable. Anyone who has left pennies in a glass of cola overnight knows that they emerge sparkling and clean. The reason for this is that the phosphoric acid in the drink dissolves the oxide layer that has formed on the coin. So one option is to drink water. "Still or sparkling?" waiters ask in restaurants. If you're not brave enough to say "tap," dazzling can be a welcome change.

Whenever you're in a group, chances are at least one person will declare sparkling water is unhealthy for you, but is there any proof to back up that claim?

Let us begin with the stomach. Under pressure, carbon dioxide is added to create fizzy water. As a result, water includes weak acids like carbonic acid. If you gulp it down, you may experience hiccups or indigestion. But what if you take your time drinking it? Is there any truth to the claim that it is bad for your stomach?

It appears that the opposite is true. Patients with regular dyspepsia or constipation were randomly allocated to consume either still or sparkling water for 15 days in a modest but double-blind randomized experiment. They were then subjected to a battery of tests. Individuals who drank sparkling water had better results than those who drank tap water.

If you drink a lot of sparkling water, you could feel bloated, but researchers in Japan discovered that this side effect could be beneficial. A group of ladies were asked to fast overnight and then slowly drink either still or sparkling water. They discovered that 900 ml of gas was released from just 250 ml of water, so it's no surprise that the women's bellies dilated significantly and they felt full even though they hadn't eaten. They were not bothered, and fizzy water has been advised as a technique to avoid overeating because it helps you feel fuller.

Do you have Bone Issues?

And you may have heard of people purposefully allowing fizzy drinks to go flat before consuming them if they are dehydrated from a stomach upset, vomiting, or even a hangover. However, a review of this practice in children with acute gastroenteritis discovered that there is little evidence that it works and that, when compared to rehydration powders, which are specifically formulated to contain replacement salts and sugars in the correct proportions, such drinks contain far lower levels of sodium and potassium than rehydration drinks. Hence, it's best to stick to the original.

Surely any acid, no matter how weak, will dissolve the enamel of our teeth.

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Yet, if sparkling water is safe for your stomach, what about your bones? Does it make them weaker? Again, the data says otherwise. A tiny Canadian study published in 2001 discovered that youth who drank a lot of fizzy beverages (not sparkling water) had less calcium in their bones, but the researchers couldn't identify whether this was due to the drinks themselves or because people who consumed them preferred them over milk.

The Framingham Heart Study, which began in 1948, tracked a group of people for several years in order to learn more about the risk factors for heart disease. Some of their descendants are now taking part in the Framingham Osteoporosis Study, which entails thorough testing every four years by Tufts University researchers in Boston. The researchers investigated the association between bone density and carbonated drinks in 2006. They examined the various sorts of drinks drunk by the 2,500 people who took part in the study in great detail.

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They discovered that women (but not men) who consumed cola-flavored fizzy beverages three times per week had hip bones with reduced average bone mineral density. Other carbonated beverages had no effect. According to the authors, the impact is most likely due to caffeine and the activities of phosphoric acid (which is not present in sparkling water).It is plausible that it will inhibit calcium absorption in some way, but no one knows how. Even ten years later, there is still debate on how diet affects bone health.

So far, drinking sparkling water appears to be safe for bones and stomachs. But what about your teeth? Surely any acid, no matter how weak, will dissolve the enamel of our teeth? Perhaps not. There has been very little research on sparkling water in particular, but much more on other fizzy drinks. Barry Owens of the University of Tennessee College of Dentistry in Memphis, Tennessee, USA, did a study in 2007 comparing several fizzy drinks. Cola-based drinks were shown to be the most acidic in his study, followed by diet-based cola drinks and coffee.

The Aggregate Effect

He contends that it is not simply the initial pH of a drink that is important, but how strongly the drink retains its acidity in the presence of other items because saliva as well as other foods are present in a real-life mouth and may change the levels of acidity. This is referred to as "buffering capacity." A review of various drinks ranks them in the following order in terms of buffering capability: Cola and other non-fruit-based carbonated drinks were the most acidic (with diet versions marginally better), followed by fruit-based fizzy drinks, fruit juice, and coffee. In other words, some fizzy drinks can weaken the enamel's firmness.

Poonam Jain of the Southern Illinois University School of Dental Medicine demonstrated that the enamel begins to dissolve after immersing it in different soft beverages for 6, 24, and 48 hours. Some claim that this isn't realistic because we don't keep a drink in our mouth for that long. Yet, over a long period of time, even a few seconds per slurp add up.

A case study published in 2009 of a 25-year-old bank worker whose front teeth wore out after four years of drinking half a liter of cola per day, followed by three years of increasing that to a liter and a half per day and adding in some fruit juice, should be enough to scare anyone. Nevertheless, how you drink alcohol also matters. "Holding the liquid in his mouth for several seconds and tasting before swallowing," it was said of this man. Researchers in Sweden compared short-sipping, long-sipping, gulping, nipping (whatever it is), and sucking. They discovered that the longer a drink remained in the mouth, the greater the reduction in pH in that person's mouth. To put it another way, the more acidic the mouth becomes, Drinking through a straw, on the other hand, directs the liquid to the back of your mouth, where it is less likely to cause damage (1^✔ ✔Trusted Source
Dental erosion and severe tooth decay related to soft drinks: a case report and literature review

Go to source).

But what about mineral water that sparkles? Catriona Brown of the University of Birmingham tested what happened when she placed extracted human teeth with no symptoms of attrition in jars for 30 minutes with several flavors of flavored sparkling water. Except for a half-centimeter-diameter test region that was left unpolished, the teeth had been varnished. They discovered that the effect of the drinks on the teeth was comparable to, and occasionally even greater than, the effect of orange juice, a drink known to erode tooth enamel. Lemon, lime, and grapefruit had the most acidic flavors, most likely due to the use of citric acid to produce a pleasant taste.

So flavored mineral waters aren't as safe as plain water, but how about sparkling water with no additional flavors? There have been few studies on this subject. But, in 2001, the Birmingham team tested seven different types of mineral water on extracted teeth to see what happened. They discovered that sparkling waters had a pH of 5 to 6 (not as acidic as some cola drinks, which can have a pH as high as 2.5), compared to still water, which was neutral at 7. In other words, they are, as suspected, mild acids.

Nevertheless, the erosive potential of that weak acid on the teeth was 100 times less than that of several other types of fizzy drinks. Of course, the mouth is a different environment than a jar, but the evidence for injury does not appear to be very strong so far.

Thus, if you want a change from plain old water, although it's somewhat acidic, there's no good evidence that it's damaging to your bones, stomach, or teeth. But, if you want to be safe and keep it away from your teeth when you say "still or sparkling," you should also request a straw.

Reference:

1. Dental erosion and severe tooth decay related to soft drinks: a case report and literature review - (https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2676420/)

Source-Medindia