Drinking piss sick

Whatever you want to call it, the practice of drinking urine goes back millennia. Known today as urine therapy, urophagia, or urotherapy, the medicinal use of urine is still practiced in some parts of the world. Reports dating back to ancient Rome, Greece, and Egypt suggest that urine therapy has been used to treat everything from acne to cancer. There was a time when doctors tested for diabetes in urine by taste. So, should you be mixing your morning pee into your morning smoothie? Probably not.

Urophagia is the consumption of urine. Urine was used in several ancient cultures for various health, healing, and cosmetic purposes; urine drinking is still practiced today, though no health benefit to it has been proven. In extreme cases, people drink urine if no other potable fluid is available, although numerous credible sources including the US Army Field Manual advise against it. Urine is also consumed as a sexual activity. These guides state that drinking urine tends to worsen rather than relieve dehydration due to the salts in it, and that urine should not be consumed in a survival situation, even when no other fluid is available. While some people in dire straits have drunk urine, whether this actually helped or hindered their situation is unclear.

At MSR, we often get this question: Can you filter your urine and drink it for rehydration in an emergency situation? Should you? The confusion surrounding this topic is understandable.

Say hello to the latest health fad - it's even yellower than a turmeric latte, and more bitter than a charcoal lemonade. While drinking your own pee seems like the kind of thing you'd only do if you were trapped up a mountain or stranded in a desert somewhere, it looks like some people have started gulping down the golden stuff in the privacy of their own homes. And give it a go she did.