Doctor issues stark warning over health drink that can 'explode' when you take a sip
A doctor has issued a stark warning to anyone who loves kombucha.
Kombucha is a great alternative to sugary, fizzy drinks that could benefit your health thanks to its antioxidants, vitamins, and minerals. However, if left unchecked, the carbonation created by the good bacteria and yeast can result in a huge amount of pressure, which can end up fizzing out of control and exploding.
Posting to TikTok, Dr Myro Figura stitched his video with another showing a woman with her hand and arm in plaster. She told viewers: “This is a friendly reminder that if you have kombucha in your refrigerator and it’s been kind of a long time, don’t touch it. Get some oven mitts, and maybe some protective eye goggles. It will blow up.”
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Looking horrified, Dr Figura said: "Kombucha is no joke. You know how it’s made, right? You take sweet tea and add yeast and that yeast converts that sugar into alcohol.
“And then bacteria comes in and takes the alcohol and converts it into acetic acid. The whole process produces a lot of carbon dioxide which is why it fizzes but left unchecked — boom!”
The woman in the video is Morgan Lau Bailey, who hit the headlines earlier this year when her kombucha warning video went viral. Speaking about the incident to Buzzfeed, she said that the drink, a normal, store-bought variety, had been in her fridge, unopened, for about three months.
However, when she went to grab it, it exploded in her hand. She said: “I was in shock. I immediately saw that the cut on my hand was pretty bad, so I wrapped it up in paper towels and didn't look at it again because I'm squeamish.”
After being taken to A&E, doctors explained that the glass had sliced into her ring finger. Luckily, Morgan explained that she had recently got married and was wearing her wedding band, which ended up taking a lot of the impact and saving her finger from a more gruesome injury.
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