Is It A Bad Idea To Put Ice In Your Drink?

As soon as summer comes, we naturally want to cool down. We try to escape the heat in all sorts of ways. One of these is by putting ice in our drinks.

If there are no more ice-cold drinks in the fridge or freezer, we just put some ice in the drink. Problem solved! However, do you know that this is actually not a good idea? In this article we tell you when and why you should be careful with this.

Contaminated ice means a contaminated drink

Research data

Several studies have already tried to determine whether ice cubes are good and safe for health. We specifically raise a study from Italy: the results are appalling!

• In many fast food restaurants and “trendy” bars, the water used to make the ice cream was full of bacteria. The quantities were comparable to what one finds in the toilets of the same type of eateries!
• Are we now going to compare the toilet water with the ice in the drinks offered by a chain of restaurants? Yes! Worst of all, the toilets were cleaned more often than the ice machines.
• The managers of these multinational chains pointed out that the possible discovery of this bacterium was due to human contamination.
• The people who handle the ice machines and the ice cubes are the same workers who clean the toilets. These workers also come into contact with money — which is also often covered in bacteria — and scrub the floor. However, they do not wash their hands after this.

• Laboratory tests do not show any serious contamination in the drinks from these cases. However, the truth is that the bacterial count was still higher than what is considered “normal”.

So it’s good to remember that the problem isn’t with the water used to make ice.  It turned out that the water was drinkable in all cases. The spread of the bacteria takes place in the machine or through the hands of the people who handle it.

It may not be a problem if bacteria get into a healthy person’s body, but it can be a problem for certain groups. This includes children, the elderly and people with a weakened immune system.

Traveling

• You may especially need to consider this issue when traveling. In some countries or cities, the water is not safe to drink.
• There are no proper sanitation facilities in certain exotic areas in Africa, Asia and South America, for example. So the water is likely to come from polluted rivers, lakes, streams and reservoirs.
• In this particular situation, we recommend not consuming any ice cubes at all. It is usually safer to drink hot drinks. Rather that than spending several days in your hotel room because you have diarrhea and vomiting! That’s not even the most pessimistic scenario…

What if I make the ice cream myself?

So we can rely on the data from a scientific study about what happens in restaurants and cafes. What if you don’t eat at that place though? Instead of the ice cream from those restaurants, you might make your own drink at home with ice from your own freezer.

So what’s the problem in this case?

The problem is almost the same as in a catering business. Did you wash your hands before putting water in the ice machine? Were your hands clean when you put the ice cubes in the glass? Believe it or not, the situation is actually quite similar.

That’s not all. If you have not cleaned the ice machine in the refrigerator or the ice cube tray, there is a good chance that mold has developed. That mold gets into the ice bucket, from there into the drink, and eventually into your body.

It is important that you make sure that the ice cube tray and your hands are clean before putting water in it. Wash your hands to avoid transferring germs or bacteria while making the ice cubes and before serving.

Make sure you meet all hygiene requirements when making ice cubes and putting them in your glass. Then you are less likely to transmit micro-organisms that are harmful to your health.

However, there is something else to keep in mind. This may also convince you to think differently about cold drinks:  they cause irritation in the throat and vocal cords. 

Sometimes the first thing you do when you get home and feel hot is to drink a glass of soda, juice or cold water, with or without ice cubes. But this can leave you with a sore throat or even trouble speaking later on.

Cold vs. Hot Drinks: Which One Wins?

This is a really interesting aspect of ice in your drinks. It has to do with the fact that the body (especially the stomach) absorbs cold liquids.

Drinking water with ice or nearly frozen water during meals has been proven to cause indigestion. That’s why East Asians drink hot green tea instead of cold juices or soda.

When you drink cold liquids, the veins constrict. This increases the production of mucus in the body, which in turn hinders proper hydration. So this is another argument against using ice cubes in your drinks.

On the contrary, when you drink hot drinks such as tea, your intestinal peristalsis improves, digestion is accelerated, the blood is purified and the kidneys will detoxify the body.

Finally, it’s important to know that drinking something warm or hot while eating helps the body better process the fats you absorb. This prevents the fats from settling in, among other things, your veins.

We therefore recommend that you drink tea if you have a meal with vegetable or animal fats, such as oil, nuts, meat, egg yolks or butter.