Drink It Up! Science Confirms That Sprite Kills Hangovers

If bar hopping is one of your favorite activities, then you will be thrilled to know that you can drink as much as you want, and lessen your hangover with Sprite the next morning.

This new discovery will make college students and bachelor party attendees the world over much happier.

By just taking a few minutes to buy some Sprite with your favorite alcoholic beverage at the store, you can not only have a good time at night, but you don’t have to suffer through the aftereffects of your fun the next morning.
 

Previous hangover cures

There have been many cures concocted for hangovers since grapes and hops were first fermented. Black coffee and hair of the dog are two that are still touted today.

With all the history of alcoholic consumption behind us, no one has ever found something that is truly successful in relieving the nightmare results of over-drinking.

Sprite is the cure

Chinese researchers at Sun Yat-Sen University, in Guangzhou, looked at 57 beverages including herbal teas, carbonated drinks and infusions and concluded that Sprite’s ingredients outperformed any other solution.

The second best cure was plain soda water.

What causes a hangover?

The researchers determined that the symptoms of a hangover are caused not by the alcohol consumed, but by the process the body goes through to break down the drink afterward.

When we drink alcohol, an enzyme is released by our liver into our blood called alcohol dehydrogenase (ADH), which allows the body to break down the ethanol in alcohol, and turn it into a chemical called acetaldehyde (ALDH).

This chemical reduces the amount of alcohol that moves into the bloodstream. Then it goes through a second stage of breakdown into acetate, which is generally harmless.

Acetate is even known to have some beneficial health effects. However, it is the in-between stage chemical, acetaldehyde, that causes the miserable morning-after suffering of nausea and aches that we call a hangover.

Curing the hangover

The scientists in China tested a wide array of drinks to see how they interacted with these chemicals.

While most beverages did not impact the chemical reaction that caused hangovers, a hemp seed herbal drink caused hangovers to increase in length, while Sprite caused the ALDH break down process to speed up.

The increased speed of breaking down the ALDH significantly lessened the length of the hangover.