The science of saline – why can we drink pure water, but when we put water into our bodies in other ways, like an IV, must we add minerals to it?

Question

The science of saline – why can we drink pure water, but when we put water into our bodies in other ways, like an IV, must we add minerals to it?

In: 480

Answer 1

Chemist here, the pure water you are talking about is a commercial farce meant to sell under the guise that it is cleaner. If you were to drink actual “Pure” water, that being a jug of just water molecules and nothing else, it would be horrible as it would strip your body of all those lovely minerals and nutrients as it doesn’t like to exist in that pure state. It is an amazing solvent.

For saline, it is a specific salt concentration to more closely match blood and it is sterilized so there is a lower chance for infection.