Wednesday, January 17, 2007

Waterblogged

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I had been meaning to post on the death of the California woman who accidentally killed herself drinking too much water during a radio station sponsored contest. I was going to question why the woman and the radio station would embark on such a dangerous proposition as a water drinking contest. Surely, I thought, it was common knowledge that consuming too much water can be fatal. Well I guess I was mistaken. Everyone is acting surprised. As Richard Roeper, no dummy, put it in his column today:
Who knew you could die from drinking too much water and not going to the bathroom?
Well, ummmm, I thought everyone did. Sometimes (just sometimes!) I’m wrong.

Still, I can’t imagine there was no one at the radio station aware that this could happen. Don’t they run these things by their attorneys and their insurance company first? Not that attorney’s are medical experts necessarily but surely there’s been some litigation involving this sort of thing. And an insurance company must have a clue about the risk (or maybe the risk is so small they didn’t care).

The whole thing is strange to me but not for the same reason most people find it curious.

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