We certainly don’t recommend that you partake of the grape regularly, especially on a heavy basis. But, once in a while, almost anyone can get caught up in the joy of a happy occasion and drink too much.
Hangover remedies abound, and most of them don’t seem to work very well. However, there’s actually a way to prevent an over-indulgent evening from becoming a dreary morning after – edible charcoal.
Hangovers are caused by substances called congeners – and activated charcoal absorbs them. In an experiment conducted at Columbia University College of Pharmaceutical Sciences in New York City, researchers found that in test-tube conditions similar to a person’s stomach, activated charcoal absorbed 93 per cent of one congener and 82 per cent of another.
In a second experiment, 68 volunteers – non-drinkers and moderate social drinkers – drank either 2 fl. oz of whisky, which has a high level of congeners, or 2 fl. oz of charcoal-filtered vodka, which has almost none. The researchers then measured their hangover symptoms the next day: 25 per cent of the whisky group had stomach-aches, 27 per cent-had bad breath, 9 per cent had headaches, 7 per cent had dizziness and 6 per cent had fatigue. On the other hand, only 2 per cent of the vodka group had headaches or stomach upset, and there was no bad breath, dizziness or fatigue (Southwestern Medicine).
The time to prevent the ‘morning after’ is the night before. A few tablets of activated charcoal taken before going to bed after an evening of overÂindulgence may do the trick.