With hovering deadlines, family impositions and personal fitness goals to fulfill, who doesn’t crave for more energy? We get dependent, literally, on external energy sources, like 5-hour Energy. It claims as well to contain important minerals and vitamins and provide you a five hours’ energy boost without a crash.
Such positive claims may leave you wondering ‘is 5-hour Energy bad for you?’. Let’s get into some deep and consider how bad is 5-hour Energy for you, having side effects and what alternatives can be adopted.
Table of Contents
What is 5-hour energy?
The 5-hour Energy drink bears synthetic vitamins, amino acids and high levels of caffeine to stimulate our nervous system.
Splenda, synthetic B Vitamins, phenylalanine, taurine, caffeine, enzymes and tyrosine are some of the ingredients it contains.
The caffeine amount in 5-hour Energy shots is from 215 milligrams to 242 milligrams that depends on whether it’s the regular version or the extra strength version. However, this is more than even double the caffeine a cup of coffee contains.
Significance of 5 Hour Energy
5-hour Energy is often criticized for being a bad energy drink due to its high caffeine content and potential health risks. Excessive consumption of energy beverages like 5-hour Energy has also been linked to weight gain and kidney disease.
It contains a concentrated "energy blend" that includes caffeine, amino acids, and other ingredients. While it claims to provide an energy boost and mental alertness, consuming caffeine in such high amounts can lead to adverse health effects.
One of the main concerns is its impact on blood pressure. The caffeine content in 5-hour Energy can cause a spike in blood pressure, especially in individuals with high blood pressure or pre-existing conditions.
Can it Affect Health
Moreover, the artificial sweeteners and malic acid in these drinks can have adverse reactions in some people, leading to sleep disturbances and disruptions in sleep patterns.
It's crucial to maintain adequate hydration when consuming caffeine and to be mindful of your body weight and any pre-existing conditions.
While 5-hour Energy may offer short-term energy benefits, its potential health risks and adverse effects make it a questionable choice for sustained energy or overall health.
Suggested Reading: How To Get Xanax
How is 5-hour Energy bad?
Energy drinks are, undoubtedly, a famous beverage choice, as they usually claim to boost our energy levels, physical performance and mental alertness, people’s buying them isn’t a wonder.
As elaborated by Caffeine Informer, the whole energy shot market in 2020 made a total of $977 million, and one brand particularly dominated a massive 89% of that market, and that was 5-hour Energy, and these energy drinks are more frequently consumed by people aging between 12 and 34.
If you’re consuming too much energy drinks, you may find its indications in your body. You may experience following side effects: -
1. Increased Risk of Heart Disease
‘Vasoactive metabolites’, such as caffeine, taurine and glucuronolactone contained in energy drinks like 5-hour Energy can prove destructive to your cardiovascular health.
As consuming energy drinks can lead to an increased diastolic and systolic blood pressure, heart rate, cardiac output, breathing frequency and a decreased supply of blood to the brain.
Your heart puts in more effort to pump blood to the rest of your body when blood pressure is high. Then, after a time, your tissues inside your arteries get damaged owing to high blood pressure as cholesterol and fat build up in artery walls. Eventually, all this may cause serious problems like a stroke or heart attack.
2. Kidney Damage
For our body, kidneys are an important filtration system. They are crucial for removing waste and extra fluid and balancing out minerals in our blood.
Well, the excess caffeine contained in energy drinks can do harm to kidneys over time. As being diuretic (a substance that increases urine production), excessive caffeine intake can lead to dehydration and constriction of blood vessels.
3. Stress, Depression and Anxiety
Energy drinks often claim to boost physical performance, mental alertness and mood. However, their consistent and excessive intake may have opposite effect as well.
Energy drinks, such as 5-hour energy are associated with mental wellbeing combined with side effects, like anxiety, stress and depressive symptoms. Such kind of side effects are more severe when a consumer takes five or more energy drinks each week.
4. Tooth Decay
While drinking a standard energy drink, like 5-hour Energy, you might be drinking upwards of 40n grams of sugar, allowing plaque bacteria to feed on sugar in order to break down the hard surface of your teeth, the tooth enamel, which results in cavities.
If you are thinking to switch to a sugar-free energy drink -considering the damage it can cause to your mouth and your whole body, such as obesity, diabetes, etc.
It also won’t make any difference, as an average consumer isn’t quite well aware of the serious consequences of the acid contained in energy drinks that impact the tooth enamel even more.
5. Weight gain
The calories contained in energy drinks are due to sugar content mostly and likely result in weight gain for you. It is already established fact that consuming artificially sweetened beverages, like energy drinks, can build a liking for overly sugary flavors, resulting in reduction of desire for naturally sweetened healthier alternatives.
Unbalanced diet coupled with weight gain. The artificial sweetener sucralose is said to be linked to the Type B diabetes, according to a British Medical Journal study.
6. Insomnia
The caffeine contained in energy drinks, such as 5- hour Energy, can keep you mentally alert and physically energized, but it can end up, unfortunately, backfiring when you get ready to get some sleep.
There is a sleep-promoting chemical in our brain, called adenosine, which keeps producing and building up the longer we stay awaken. The more the adenosine in our brain, the sleepier we feel.
The point to be noted here is that the caffeine contained in energy drinks blocks adenosine receptors and causes us to stay alert when bed time is near. Eventually, it leads to daytime dysfunction and use of sleep medications.
7. Headaches
As caffeine intake results in stimulating the brain, constricting blood vessels and dehydration, which can, eventually, lead to headaches. However, cutting back abruptly on caffeine can worsen the matters.
When we consume caffeine on regular basis, our bodies can become dependent on it. This can result in triggering a caffeine withdrawal if you abruptly stop caffeine intake.
Though, withdrawal symptoms may vary for each individual, the incidence of a headache, however, is about 50%, which may begin around 12 to 24 hours after the caffeine intake is stopped and may last even up to nine days. So, stopping caffeine intake should be at gradual pace, instead of going turkey.
8. Sticky Blood
When there are too many cells and proteins found floating in your blood, it gets thicker which leads to blood clotting, and which is believed to be the particular reason behind cardiovascular problems.
If it’s combined with excessive intake of energy drinks that cause constriction of blood vessels and increased heart rate as aforementioned, it can be a disastrous combination for your health.
9. Type 2 Diabetes
The high levels of artificial sweeteners, like sucralose, contained in energy drinks can lead to your risk of metabolic disorders, combined with type 2 diabetes.
Actually, energy drinks can cause an increase in blood glucose levels, which causes serious implications to your health, including insulin resistance that is associated with type 2 diabetes.
10. Addiction
Energy drinks, like 5-hour Energy, cause addiction owing to their high levels of artificial sweeteners and synthetic caffeine. Their regular intake can lead to dependency and stopping their consumption abruptly can result in withdrawal symptoms.
11. Overdose On Caffeine
Caffeine intake in small amounts can be tolerated by many, but things begin getting complicated when it is taken too much.
Certain medications or conditions can result in some people’s having sensitivity to caffeine and its effects. As suggested by FDA, healthy adults can take up to 400 milligrams of caffeine a day and there are no dangers or negative effects associated with it.
However, it was revealed in an article published in Toxicology Reports that doses of 500 milligrams stand out to be resulting in increased tension, nervousness, irritability, anxiety, paresthesia, perspiration, palpitations and possibly dizziness.
Alternatives to 5 Hours Energy
After going through the various adverse health threats the consumption of energy drinks can cause to your body, there isn’t any need to elaborate further how 5-hour Energy is bad. If you want to get rid of the side effects of 5-hour Energy shots, we’ve suggested below some alternatives to it that you can adopt: -
- Filtered water
- Green Tea
- Fresh Fruit Juice
- Coconut Water
- Herbal Tea
- Black Coffee
Conclusion
So, saying the bottom line, though energy drinks like 5-hour Energy are, undoubtedly, a famous beverage choice as they usually claim to boost our energy levels, physical performance and mental alertness and people’s buying them isn’t a wonder.
However, we can’t ignore the fact that such energy shots and drinks provide our bodies with artificial and synthetic energy and can do quite opposite to what they claim.
Thus, it’s better to take as lesser amount of energy drinks as you can, if you are unable to get rid of them completely. Instead, you can gradually start replacing them with healthy and natural beverages like fresh fruit juices, green tea, coconut water etc. followed by completely quitting their use.
Frequently Asked Questions
How bad is 5-hour energy for you?
The caffeine contained in it, combined with other ingredients such as phenylalanine, taurine, tyrosine and artificial sweeteners, can cause various problems such as constriction of blood vessels, teeth decay, kidney and heart problems, weight gain, insomnia, headaches and stress.
Are 5-hour energies bad for your liver?
There is a high level of caffeine and artificial sweeteners, combined with other ingredients, that can strain the liver if it’s consumed excessively. Your liver metabolizes caffeine and its excessive amount can lead to liver overload. Thus, consistent and excessive intake of 5-hour Energy can cause liver issues over time.
What are the side effects of stopping 5-Hour Energy drinks?
Stopping 5-hour Energy intake suddenly may lead to withdrawal-like symptoms, such as fatigue, headaches irritability and difficulty concentrating. However, gradually reducing 5-hour Energy intake can help minimize these effects.
What is the safest energy drink to drink?
However, you can keep your safe if you keep your energy drinks intake moderate and choose those with moderate caffeine levels, minimal added sugar, fewer artificial additives and brands that focus on natural ingredients.
