While most people have heard the advice to drink eight cups of water a day, there is some flexibility there and people are capable of drinking both too much and too little, though the latter is more common.
Drinking too little can lead to dehydration which can cause a range of symptoms from dizziness to, in some extreme cases, death. Drinking too much also has potentially dangerous impacts because too much water in the body affects the body’s electrolyte balance, experts said. They shared advice for how much a person should be drinking and the signs someone has had too much water — and if the right balance exists for the average water drinker.
While eight cups of water is a good rule of thumb when it comes to how much to drink, people also ingest fluids from the food they eat and from other beverages. About 20% of daily fluid intake usually comes from food. Between water, other drinks and food, adult men living in temperate climates need to ingest about 15.5 cups of fluids a day, according to the U.S. National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine. Adult women living in temperate climates, one with average yearly temperatures that are not extreme, need to ingest about 11.5 cups of fluids a day. Women should drink more in a day if they’re menstruating, pregnant or lactating.
Read more at CBSnews.com
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