Sarah Katz, 21, had a heart condition and was not aware of the drink’s caffeine content, which exceeded that of cans of Red Bull and Monster energy drinks combined, according to a legal filing.
Sarah Katz, 21, had a heart condition and was not aware of the drink’s caffeine content, which exceeded that of cans of Red Bull and Monster energy drinks combined, according to a legal filing
I hope this lawsuit forces them to remove this. I'm sorry this young girl died. This isn't the first issue they had with this drink. My husband and I were discussing it months ago. He thought it was just lemonade - sugar, water, lemons. We didn't figure out why he was up all night. Later someone old him how much caffeine it has. We had no idea. It's dangerous to those with high bp.
8 months ago Food Theroy did agreat video on this. It's very appropriately titled given the unfortunate circumstances. To say this drink was caffeineted is a major understatement, it was basically four and a half monsters in one cup.
Franky, it was reckless for Panera to make and sell this drink and they absolutely earned this lawsuit. There was pently of forewarning that the abnormally high caffeine content in this was dangerous for certain groups. Hope the family wins big, nothing will bring back their loved one but this could've been avoided with more clear nutrientional warnings.
Reporting in after having just come from Panera due to this article. Didn't read article, and it might be click bait or might not. I do know that the drink in question is slapped right beside all the typical juices and sodas, and the label says "contains as much as our dark roast coffee" then below that, even less obvious it gives serving sizes & caffeine amounts. Call me crazy, but I doubt your average consumer is going to consider just how much caffeine might be in LEMONADE.
Panera is definitely losing this one. It could even be argued that they chose a product with that much caffeine and to not really advertise it based on the amounts of caffeine of the 30oz literally being a hair's width away from the potential danger threshold.
I drank a monster energy once (well, to be precise, about half of one.),back when energy drinks were still relatively new and there wasnt as much common knowledge about them as there is today.
Just that half of a can was enough to make me feel like I was going to die.
My resting heart rate was over 150bpm, was shaking with tremors, and cold sweating. I genuinely thought I was gonna die.
And I have never so much as touched another one, and will never touch another one, for the rest of my life.
They are incredibly dangerous and shouldnt be something any kid or idiot can walk into a store and buy with couple bucks.
and I have absolutely no idea how there are people that exist out there that can drink 6-10 of them a day without spontaneously combusting from tremor induced cellular friction.
This new trend of soda that's made of cane sugar and natural coloring is pretty stupid. It's still a ton of calories and acid on your teeth. At Chipotle, cava, Panera, I'll get sparkling water out of the Sprite tap and then flavor with a dash of whatever nu soda they have.
Panera, I feel, is 100% at fault here for trying to make soda and apparently ENERGY DRINKS seem innocuous and healthy.
That's insane. I hope not only that they win the lawsuit, but that companies understand stimulants can be harder (even dangerous) on some people.
The way caffeine affects me does not risk my life, but it can get ugly as I have a mental health condition that gets triggered by stimulants. It is so common to rely on caffeine nowadays, and it's present in many beverages and snacks. People forget it is still a drug.
There should be labels and there should be less of a presence of caffeine (and other legal drugs) in unrelated products. I mean, it's normal if coffee has caffeine, it shouldn't be normal that a lemonade has caffeine.
I went to the doctor recently and they said I had high blood pressure. The first thing they asked me was if I drank energy drinks. Needless to say, I switched to coffee.
There used to be a product called Redline: White Heat from VPX (same people that make bang with the unhinged CEO). It had to be taken off the market because it had an amphetamine analogue in it called AMP Citrate or DMBA.
One scoop of that stuff made me feel like I was going to die. My friend who took Ritalin at the time told me it was more powerful than any other stimulant he had before.
It’s crazy to think this was openly available at health supplement stores for years before the FDA caught wind.
Any free market absolutists want to try to explain to me how situations like this should be handled?
Is this poor girl just the first "collateral damage" that allows the market to (eventually) fix itself? Is it her own fault for not being an expert on caffeinated beverages before buying the drink?
In this case I think they're going to have a strong defense based on both labeling and proximate cause(meaning you have to prove with preponderance of evidence that the caffeine was the primary cause of her death). The truth is, you just die with this condition in excitable situations, and she was at a birthday party. Will be interesting to see if it settles or goes to trial.