Dear Doctor, 

Sometimes my five-year-old son takes 4 bottles of soda a day. Is that too much? If so, how can I control his appetite?

Martha

Dear Martha,

No soda drink is healthy for the body. Although soda companies claim that it is an energy giving and refreshing drink, soda contains lots of sugar, salt, water, flavouring agent, colour and some acid. Soda drinks have become one of the lead causes for childhood as well as adult obesity seen in developed countries, a problem emerging in developing countries as well. It provides only calories and no nutrition whatsoever, contrary to popular belief.

It also increases the risk for diabetes and hypertension. After taking soda at meal time, more so if taken in big quantity, one would not have appetite for food. Therefore the quantity of food consumed would be less than necessary, thus depriving the body of some essential nutrients.

It also contains much salt which if taken in excess can cause dehydration and even electrolyte imbalance in severe cases. High sugar content and presence of acid used as a preservative leads to chronic dyspepsia, even chronic gastritis and peptic ulcer disease, when consumed much over time. These conditions manifest as burning pain in the abdomen, nausea and / or vomiting.

The soda may give some relief in flatulence if present — this is the only advantage apart from being good in taste.

There are no studies as such to quantify the amount of soda which one can take. How much one can tolerate without being sick would depend on age, body weight, quantity and duration of soda consumed, level of physical activity and presence of other sickness.

Ideally the child should not take any soda. If he likes it much, keep it restricted to maybe one or 2 in a week. Introduce him to fresh fruit juices which are healthy and nutritious as well.

You can try different combinations of fruit juices like mixing juice of 2 fruits together or combining fresh fruit juice with milk or yoghurt. The child would find this more tasty and look forward to drinking it.

Dr Rachna Pande  is a specialist in internal medicine at Ruhengeri Hospital