How Caffeine Damages Our Body

Coffee, iced tea, hot chocolate, soft drinks, energy drinks, chocolate bars, even hearing these words makes us crave more and more for them but drugs it’s some sort of nightmare for everyone. Caffeine, we all know it’s used in most of the beverages and foods, even though caffeine is a drug still it is neglected as we are addicted to that aroma. Just like cocaine, heroin, LSD, etc. caffeine is also a drug that affects our body in many ways like speeding up heart and breathing. Caffeine is a stimulant drug with long term effects on our heart, bone density, and blood pressure.

Caffeine is a natural stimulant that affects our CNS (Central Nervous System) which increases our alertness and provides an upgrade to our body. Therefore in both short term and long term consumption of caffeine leads to problems like tachycardia, pressor effect, bone density, and caffeine jitters. Tachycardia is the change of speed and regularity of heart which can be serious in the future. The pressor effect is the rise in blood pressure which is noticeable across age groups, familiar to hypertension. Jitters are the physical sensation of a sudden crash of energy by increasing the heart's contractions and general blood flow. Larger amounts of caffeine can make us annoyed and fidgety, not only this much it even makes us anxious, frequent urination, and upset stomach. How people will react depends on their endurance.

Besides those side effects, it's not that intake of caffeine will make our immune system fragile or unsteady. We can still consume it only if we take some safety measures. Regular consumption of 400 milligrams caffeine does not affect our heart rhythm but for pregnant or breastfeeding mothers it's recommended less than 200 milligrams to avoid adverse birth outcomes. Also, it's told not to withdraw from caffeine if you've already taken it as it can give us headaches, muscle cramps and generally makes us feel uneasy.

This concludes that though caffeine has an aroma that gives us craving sensation still it's safer to intake moderately for our well being and avoid having a cardiac arrhythmia, pressor effect, having lower bone mass, and caffeine jitters as it appears not to be harmful to us. In short, we should learn to control our body and mind to live a better and maintained life.

By: Sudeeksha

School: Ramjas, R.K.Puram

Class: 10th