I was referring to a different one, with a hyper young women saying she doesn’t usually drink caffeine, and just realized she’s been ODing on caffeine from these lemonades she’s had while using Panera as a piece to work remotely. It also predates the death by a good margin.
That tiktok is mentioned in this youtube video as the origin of his investigation.
I agree with your assessment of journalistic ambulance chasing, but I would not have been surprised to see (in a day and age where a solid third of my “news” feed is full of a curated lists of “reactions” from social media) comments from such friends identified and reposted from social media. And that’s why I was careful to say it was only a “faint bell of suspicion”. I could very easily see if even the deceased DID say such things, that they don’t want to share it because it could easily feel like blaming a victim.
Which is ALSO why I said that I was waiting on all the formalities, that at best we’re working with enlightened speculation, and that we’ve been spending far too much time throwing blame in all directions.
I haven’t read the last hundred or so posts, but I’m in the Panera in Danvers, MA, right now, and the dispensers for charged lemonades are behind the order counter, accessible only to employees. The rest of the drink dispensers are out in the seating area, where customers can get refills at will.
That’s also the case in Suffolk, VA: Charged lemonades behind the order counter.
I asked the employee if she’d stop me from getting more than one, and she said, “Nah.”
@ParallelLines, if you’re still holding out for a statement from a friend of the deceased, that LegalEagle video points to a statement (around the 6 minute mark, though I did watch on Nebula, so it could be off by a minute or two) from a friend in a news article basically saying (here I summarize) “Sarah was very careful and knowledgeable about her condition. If she’d known how much caffeine was in the drink, she wouldn’t have touched it with a 10-foot pole” (that last bit is an exact quote, the 10-foot pole thing).
Not surprisingly (to me, anyway) LE does not seem to think that this lawsuit is frivolous. A tough case, perhaps, but not frivolous.
Thank you very much for the heads up!
(for anyone wondering, here’s my relevant question from upthread).
I’m not saying Panera is innocent, and I’m glad they’re putting better, clearer information in place. Nor do I want the deceased to be blamed in what could easily have been a simple misunderstanding. I just want more facts, more testimony, and less speculation. As such, I endorse the case, because it may well provide the above, including my desire for witness testimony. But I don’t think I’ll prejudge the feasibility of said case until I do know more.
So, I’ll agree with @ASL_v2.0’s summary of the video - a tough case, but not frivolous. I’m torn between the “buyer beware” POV and the marketing of a just shy of the maximum-suggested dosage (wink wink) drink. And so I’ll let all parties (and their lawyers) involved settle this in court, since that seems the best place.
I was looking over my post and realized that while I knew what I meant, it came out less sympathetic than intended. So, since I’m past my edit window, let me clarify:
By “buyer beware” - I was trying (poorly) to say that so-called “charged” drinks are often full of sugar, caffeine, and other ‘energy boosting’ elements. While there is debate about how they’re marked (and I for one am not amused by the ‘about the same as our dark roast coffee’) in the case of someone with pre-existing conditions, especially one who per the witness was “careful and knowledgeable” should ask for more details.
Then again, I’ve been twenty-something and more careless, or, if not careless, less careful than I should have been. I think that’s were I keep getting tripped up - careless is often literally that, not taking any care. Careful is what I just mentioned. But there’s a huge range of gray in the middle.
Overall I am… sympathetic to the deceased, and as I said repeatedly, extremely unamused at Panera’s marketing of a just-shy-of-maximum daily dosage as a single beverage, especially as part of a sipping club.
So as a person, yeah, I lean towards Panera owing this family a settlement, and taking the steps they have (and more perhaps) in mitigating the risk going forward. As a person existing in a web of interconnected laws that at times seem intrusive, I wonder what level of warnings can or should be sufficient. And as someone who is absolutely NOT a lawyer, I see lots of wiggle room for reasonable doubt, and am glad that I’m not in any way responsible for that evaluation.
Sorry for the book.
Well, at the risk of being accused of cribbing off @Shalmanese, maybe the right answer is no amount of warnings. As in, this was such a poorly conceived product, that it was essentially defective as designed, and *is/was the beverage equivalent of a ladder designed with detachable rungs or a car windshield made of unlaminated plate glass.
*Although they have since, per the LE video, somewhat reduced the caffeine content.
In our local Panera they are now behind the counter as well.
That’s a fair choice - I personally feel that any beverage being sold in a sip club should probably have sufficiently reduced caffeine so that you could drink 2+ cups without reaching that maximum (say 195 if they still want to be cutesy, and the LE reporting said it’s currently at 260) but, people will always go to excess. It’s a drug, and we’re (as a nation) addicted.
Apparently though, it’s a profit leader for Panera and unless it’s illegal, I suspect they’ll fight tooth and nail. So I again endorse the lawsuit - if nothing else because it’ll make more people aware of the risks. And that getting a dangerous dose of caffeine can happen easily even if you don’t think about it.
The end of the Legal Eagle video is where I see the issue. Sure, she has a special condition, and the duty of care is to the average person. But, when you factor in the number of refills that would be common on a “free sip” program, you can get to dangerously high levels of caffeine intake.
I also notice the lawsuit claims that the caffeine levels were not in fact displayed at the location and time in question. It would seem odd for the lawyers to say that if the usual labels linked here were present–the ones that do at least mention the exact amount of caffeine.
I suspect that the other people having reported having issues not realizing how much caffeine was in the drink will be relevant. The fact that they consumed what Dr. Mike says is a dangerous amount for their heart does seem relevant, even if it wasn’t bad enough that someone verifiably died from it.
Though I do wonder about that. It doesn’t seem like the caffeine is necessarily still in your system whenever the problems actually arise. It would seem at least plausible that some people have died or at least had injuries caused by the caffeine consumption but were not identified.
At the very least, I am happy that changes have already been made, even if the lawsuit doesn’t wind up going anywhere. It seems they are making this safer, adding warnings, calling it an energy drink, separating it from the regular beverages and/or requiring you to ask for refills, and reducing the caffeine content. Those all seem like reasonable ways to try and make the product more safe.
Does it say she asked whether/how much caffeine was in it?
Even if they didn’t give the mg per ounce*, or whatever, of caffeine content, it seems to me that, for the vast majority of consumers, comparing the amount of caffeine in the lemonade to the amount in coffee is a much more relevant and meaningful comparison, anyway. Even for science-minded folks like me: I don’t know off the top of my head what the caffeine concentration of coffee or energy lemonade is, but I do know the typical dosages of coffee. The number of milligrams should be available if anyone asks, of course, but that’s not the comparison that needs to be on the label.
*And yes, I know, but America.
Was the caffeine in a 30 ounce cup of their lemonade being compared to a cup of their coffee (between 10 to 12 ounces), or to 30 ounces of their coffee?
Sorta. I drink coffee by the ~8 oz mug. I drink soda, gatorade, etc. by the 16 oz disposable fountain cup or 20 oz bottle.
Should the unit of measure be per “serving” or per oz? ISTM something like this works:
One fountain cup of this charged lemonade (no ice) has the same caffeine dose as 4 Grande straight coffees, 10 Short straight coffees, or 15 Mochiatta Supremes.
Or whatever the right number(s) and frou frou beverage comparisons are.
ISTM they must include both a comparison to no-shit traditonal black coffee and also to their other coffee-laced drinks that are actually hi-cal / low-caffeine milkshakes. Or at least milkshakes that have more caffeine than a true ice cream parlor milkshake, but less per oz than typical plain black coffee.
Lotta folks only drink the milkshakes now and really don’t know how much caffeine is in the real coffee they never drink. So they need a comparison to the beverages they do drink.
Her condition as I understand it, she should not have had Any caffeine or sugar.
She made a horrible mistake. It cost her her life.
Terrible for her loved ones.
Panera did nothing but have a product on sale. I encounter them everyday. So so many I have had to pass up over my life. I’d love to eat a giant donut and a sugary soda one morning. I’ve known since I was very young, I cannot do this.
She should’ve known better.
I don’t expect a sign in the donut shop saying if you’re diabetic don’t eat here.
I know better.
Maybe her case was milder, and her doctors gave her guidelines for safe-for-her amounts that were more than zero.
There’s just not a lot of death by caffeine. It doesn’t seem to be an issue warranting extra precautions. As I cited above, Family sues Panera Bread over possible death from energy drink-do they have a case? - #244 by susan
And as I said above, and Beck just said, it’s on us as people with a medical issue to be reasonably attentive. Or should there be Vitamin K warning signs all over kale just in case someone taking warfarin eats a big salad?