I can only suppose from what I’ve read that her condition was of a serious nature since infancy.
If her doctors were wrong, that’s not Paneras fault.
No, because kale is well known to contain vitamin K, and will be something your doctor would explicitly tell you to avoid. The relevant comparison would be whether or not they should have to put up warnings if added a ton of extra vitamin K to their salads.
From what I can tell, the precautions that are desired for the drink are all the things that energy drinks do anyways. They already contain warnings about how much caffeine they have in them. They already are marketed as something separate from the other drinks, and are sold in a separate place. They never call themselves “soda” or “lemonade” or “juice.” And they do in fact have less caffeine than this “charged lemonade.”
And the video that resurrected this thread has a doctor who says that caffeine can be dangerous for normal people’s hearts at high enough levels. If someone did get multiple refills of the charged lemonade, they could easily consume a dangerous amount of caffeine.
I know that, as @hajario mentioned, they’re trying to cover their ass now. But the stuff they’re doing to mitigate the issues all seem like improvements to me. And the fact that they’ve already reduced the caffeine content does make me dubious of why it was so high in the first place.
I can’t say if the family will win their case. I want them to, but it’s more like the Hot Coffee case. It’s not so much about the person who was harmed, but about what they were doing. If Panera was doing their job, there shouldn’t have been so many people who didn’t realize they were overdosing on caffeine. There wouldn’t have needed to be all those warnings on YouTube and TikTok.
Well said.
Unlike the donut shop of @Beckdawrek’s post a bit upthread, this product didn’t look dangerous; it just was dangerous. Compared to other products that look and taste exactly like it sold in the same serving sizes it was commonly sold in. As @Shalmanese has maintained through the thread, the ideal fix isn’t more and “better” warnings; it’s fix the product so warnings aren’t necessary.
Context matters.
Diabetics (including me) have had to learn over the last 30 years to read labels on everything due to the gratuitous sugar being increasingly added to everything, not just traditional obviously-sweet products like beck’s donuts. Which also turns eating out into a minefield unless ordering a no-dressing salad, a plain piece of meat, and steamed veg. Gratuitous sugar everywhere is necessarily very life-limiting for those sensitive to it. Converesly, added sugar in only obvious things like desserts leaves a lot more room for the afflicted to participate in mostly-normal life.
I think now and increasingly in the future we’ll all have to learn to read labels for added caffeine. And the sensitive amongst us (not me) will need to learn sooner and better or suffer the adverse consequences of unwanted inadvertent dosing. Of course if there is no labeling, or it’s well hidden, or mumbly, or in indecipherable units of measure, that will be a harder task with more mistakes made along the way.
And IMO that’s exactly where we are now. That poor woman is the poster child for sneaky gratuitous caffeine. Getting the story out and into the faces of both consumers and producers until everyone’s behavior settles into a good equilibrium is the way to minimize harm going forward.
I didn’t know this.
If you are on blood thinners and need to keep track of your vitamin K intake, you will be told that there’s a lot of vitamin K in green leafy vegetables. “There’s vitamin K in Kale” is like “there’s caffeine in that new coffee drink”. Anyone who needs to know will be aware of it.
Dang. I’m on blood thinners, and my doctor said nothing about avoiding leafy greens. No more salads?
An Ivy league adult student should have known with Long QT type 1 she shouldn’t drink any
caffeinated, fizzy, sugary drink. She should’ve been no where near a soda fountain.
Are you on Coumadin? That’s what my mom was on when she had to monitor her vitamin K intake. She and i got a lecture about it when she started on Coumadin.
(The old school advice was to avoid vitamin K, but they told us that they’d changed that, and now were trying to have patients consume a fairly constant amount of vitamin K.)
No. I’m on Pradaxa. Doesn’t Coumadin require frequent blood tests? I’m glad I’m not on that.
It requires very frequent blood tests when you start on it, and somewhat frequent blood tests after you get the right dose. And “the right dose” depends on how much vitamin K you eat, which is why people taking it are told that there’s a lot of vitamin K in green leafy vegetables.
I’ve bee on a blood thinner since I got a coronary stent, 100 mg of Aspirin daily, and I’m very ignorant about vitamins (my fault), but no one told me that vitamin K and kale is bad for me. At least, I have survived for eight years.
If you eat Kale twice a month you’re probably ok.
If you eat it everyday for a month you might need to cut back.
I eat loads of Kale in season. It will turn your belly in to a rumbly tumbly.
It is good for you, tho’
Ask a nutritionist if you’re concerned.
Thanks, Beck. I don’t eat much kale, but often broccoli and spinach. Is that a concern, too? And why is mixing blood thinners with vitamin K bad? What happens?
Leafy greens have a mild blood thinning effect. I read it would take pounds of it. But, it’s a slight concern.
You’re more likely to get lead poisoning from kale.
When to be worried about vitamin K in your diet if you’re on anticoagulants
If you’re on warfarin, AKA Coumadin or other vitamin K antagonists (acenocoumarol, phenprocoumon, fluindione which are NOT commonly used in the US), then you need to be aware of vitamin K in your foods.
If you’re on aspirin, clopidogrel (plavix), apixaban (Eliquis), dabigatran (Pradaxa), edoxaban (Lixiana), or rivaroxaban (Xarelto) then don’t worry about it.
The opposite, actually:
Leafy green vegetables, such as kale, spinach, Swiss chard, and collard greens, are great for your health and can help thicken blood, form blood clots.
Thanks for weighing in. Now I’m relieved since I take aspirin.
My bad. IA no ones D.
No Idea if you already know this, but there are a couple of online German language resources for drug information, Rote Liste and Gelbe Liste. They’ll provide info on drug interactions and the like. If I remember correctly, Rote Liste is aimed at physicians and Gelbe Liste is basically the leaflet that you would get in a pack of medicine.
Uh, Rote Liste is not the same as Rote Buch. That’s a mistake I once made at work. Very awkward.
j
This product was named “Charged Lemonade”, wasn’t it? What the hell did she THINK it was “charged” with? She didn’t just order a lemonade and got handed this stuff.
It wasn’t “sneaky gratuitous caffeine.” It was explicitly “charged” with something. And if it wasn’t booze (and I don’t think Panera sells booze", caffeine would be my 2d guess.