Is It Possible to Mainline Wine?

Overthinking ‘It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia’

I’m someone who’s always been a big believer in overthinking TV shows.

I want to know how many of the shenanigans that happen on TV are actually possible, especially some of the more outlandish ones. So when it comes to outlandish, there’s nowhere else to go but Philadelphia.

It’s Always Sunny

Created by Rob McElhenney, ‘It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia’ has been a runaway smash hit for 14 seasons.

This show takes comedy where no one else would dream, as its characters find new and exciting ways to be horrible every single episode. Whether it’s screwing each other over, or screwing over the general public; Dennis, Mac, Charlie, Frank and Dee will do just about anything to achieve their narcissistic and ever changing plans.

Chardee MacDennis: The Game of Games

In season 7 we are introduced to an insane board game invented by the gang. The name of the game was created by mashing their names together, and is an insane game of torture and triumph. However the game has one downfall, it’s too easy to cheat.

The game involves a lot of drinking (as does their entire lives), however the more you drink, the less effective you are at the game. Dennis and Dee (who have teamed up for the game) swap out the beer in their bottles for water, thus rigging the game and cheating. Luckily they’re caught after throwing their “beer” on Frank and he tastes the truth.

In Season 11 we play the game again, except this time the gang don’t trust each other not to cheat again. So they find an elegant solution to ensure everyone is drinking real alcohol…

They set up an intravenous injection for everyone and fill the bags with wine. They then mainline the wine directly into their veins, even squeezing the bags to increase the speed of dosage.

So someone had to ask… what are the health implications?

How would it work?

According to Healthline, an intravenous injection is used for very specific reasons.

An IV is used in situations when a patient needs a high dosage of medication really quickly, without the risk of overdosing. IV eliminates the risk of small amounts of medicine being lost in the digestive process, which happens with medication that’s ingested by swallowing.

An IV drip allows for a very specific amount of medicine to be directly added into your blood stream. The doctor can count on the exact quantity of medicine in the bag reaching your bloodstream because it’s being added to the bloodstream directly through a major vein. It’s also fast acting because there’s no need for the medicine to be absorbed, it’s already in its target location.

Alcohol

Just like with medicine, alcohol is ingested by swallowing (usually) with some of it making its way into your bloodstream. Unlike with medicine though, only a small amount of alcohol should be finding its way into your blood.

Your body can motabolise 20 milligrams per deciliter (mg/dL) of alcohol per hour. If your body is adding alcohol at a faster rate than it’s able to digest, your blood alcohol concentration increases and your body reacts by getting wasted.

As you may know from experience, as your blood alcohol concentration gets higher, you get progressively more wasted until you’re blacking out or vomiting.

• At 0.08% you can’t legally drive
• At 0.15% you may start blacking out
• At 0.30% you’ve probably become alcohol poisoned and the health implications are getting serious
• Over 0.40% you’re not likely to survive.

Math Time

An IV bag traditionally holds 1051ml of liquid (in this case) wine. The average 150 pound man will have about 5 litres of blood inside of his body. This means that if the gang mainlined their entire bag of wine, they’d be increasing the amount of liquid in their veins by roughly 20%.

This now means that 17.5% of the liquid running through their veins is wine, when just 0.40% is enough to kill someone. And this alcohol wasn’t metabolised into the blood, it was injected in its purest form… This means it would have hurt a lot.

The Result?

They would die, and the death would be horrible. It would be a painful, excruciating and slow death.

Their veins would feel like their burning and their bodies would react like they’re being poisoned. So you could expect lots of vomiting and diarrhoea to mix in with the screaming and crying.

See kids… isn’t health fun?

So the shenanigan doesn't pass the ‘real life’ test this time, but damn is it a good show.