Grandma's Aspirin and Coke: The Date-Rape Drug? - Medicine - English

My grandmother is a big consumer of Diet Coke; it is her drink of choice. However, whenever she needs to take pills, particularly aspirin, she insists on water. She claims that drinking Coke with aspirin makes you woozy and is equivalent to the date-rape drug. No matter how much we try and convince her otherwise, she refuses to accept it. It has become something of a joke in our family and we lovingly tease her about it quite often.

My questions are: Where did she come up with this? Was this common thinking 50 or 60 years ago? Was this ever true?

Caffeine is a stimulant. It also acts as a vasoconstrictor (constricts your blood vessels), as a diuretic, and it may even increase blood pressure.

Aspirin is an analgesic, anti-inflamitory, and anti-coagulant drug.

Apart from some other chemical reaction between the two, it looks like blood vessels will constrict and a thinned blood will flow faster and easier with increased pressure. This could lead to dizziness.

Fred you nailed it!

My mom thought this as well, but because she read that Coca-Cola could remove rust like acid.
Acid, the chemical and acid, the drug; were the same to her, thus she thought Coca-Cola would make you hallucinate. We never had soda-pop in the house. If we were allowed to have pop, it was Cott Ginger Ale only. You do not miss what you do not have. I do not drink soda-pop at all. If I want a carbonated beverage, I use an old school soda server.

Where did it go?

Cocaine was not a controlled, illegal substance in 1903. It was removed as a result of the Harrison Narcotics Tax Act.

MichalG’s Grandmother is intelligent. Coming from the popular culture Grandmother adopt and transmit knowledge to us, I believe that if you have to have an aspirin the best combination is water.

Yeah, I was just being Fred-like and asking open questions. As I understand the history, for many years the extracted cocaine was sold to the US government for pharmaceutical purposes, and the de-cocainized coca leaves were used to flavor the beverage. I think the Coca-Cola company has now dropped the coca leaves from the recipe, rather than encourage the cultivation of coca plants. Needless to say, we are a couple of steps removed from "the real thing", as the market for sugary soda water is wider than that for patent medicines and tonics.

I think caffeine was always the added ingredient in Anacin, which was supposed to make it more effective than plain aspirin.

Caffeine is added to aspirin to increase aspirin's analgesic effects and absorption. Caffeine is also a bronchial dilator and vasodilator as well as a central nervous system stimulant.

Aspirin, i.e., acetylsalicylic acid, works as an anticoagulant ('blood thinner') by inhibiting thromboxane A2 in platelets, thus inhibiting platelet aggregation during the blood coagulation cascade.

The normal pH of stomach is around 2.0. Most carbonated beverages are less acidic, with a pH of around 3.0. Aspirin has been shown to increase the risk or incidence of gastrointestinal ulcers, especially when taken in high doses or with extended use. Many aspirin formularies are buffered in an attempt at reducing the untoward side effect of gastrointestinal ulcers.

Diet Coke contains aspartame, of which the various metabolites include aspartic acid, phenylalanine, and methanol. Methanol is further metabolised to formaldehyde, formic acid, and a diketopiperazine.

As Rhondish states, these compounds Aspirin, Caffeine, and Aspartame when taken with a low pH carbonated beverage are likely to produce some 'wooziness' in some individuals due to the separate and combined pharmacological effects of the individual compounds and their metabolites. Furthermore, most elderly people are on some form of medication, which may also contribute to, or exacerbate, the unpleasant effects.