Lollobrigida is right: even too much water abuse can lead to the grave

“Irony on social media.” When I read this expression I know that someone has said something sensible. Usually this someone is not left-wing, is not protected by the conformism that shields you from every joke, and often this someone is called Francesco Lollobrigida . This time the Minister of Agriculture, to defend wine as per its patriotic mission (Enotria is another name for Italy), reminded us that everything becomes dangerous if taken in excessive doses. Everything, absolutely everything: “Abuse can have very negative consequences. Backlash can affect the brain, the heart, the kidneys. Is it wine? No, it’s water. Abuse of water can lead to death.” There they are right away, snickering, over there on social media, because they are not even capable of consulting Wikipedia under the entry “ Acute water intoxication .” For those who do not trust and demand the authority of an ancient institution, there was the Encyclopedia Britannica: “Overhydration.”

Il Fatto Quotidiano, the very newspaper on which so many ironists write, from which so many scoffers drink, in August 2023 ran the following headline: “35-year-old dies from water intoxication: he drank 2 liters in 20 minutes”. A mother from Indiana, perhaps too sweaty, perhaps too hot, on a trip to the lake with her husband and children had quickly downed bottles not of Bourbon Whiskey but of apparently harmless H2O. As soon as she got home she fainted and in the hospital, where they had taken her, she unfortunately died. The toxicologist at Indiana University Health Arnett Hospital, although unlike Lollobrigida he was not committed to promoting wine, declared: “There are some factors that can make someone more at risk, but what happens is that you have too much water and not enough sodium in your body”. It seems that it is better not to exceed two liters a day, especially when you have kidney problems.

These ironic people are presumptuous and snobbish. Truly laughter abounds in the mouths of fools, and I translate the saying of the fathers because down there in social media, in addition to medicine, they are also poor in Latin. They certainly do not cultivate the cult of Horace, the poet of moderate hedonism who would have recognized as his brother both Lollobrigida and Carlo Nordio, the Venetian Epicurus: "You must never exaggerate, vices must be spread out. It is good to have many but it is good to spread them out so that they are balanced". In short, "est modus in rebus", there is a right measure for water as for wine as for Negroni. There is certainly a right measure for irony too but down there in social media they will never find it.

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