As the concepts of wellness and skin care increasingly overlap, drinkable beauty supplements have become an undeniable trend. From Moon Juice's now-famous Beauty Dust to Republic of Tea's Get Gorgeous Herb Tea for Clear Skin, a growing number of beauty drinks have popped up on the market, promising to go down smoothly and improve your appearance from the inside out. But one beauty "drink" in particular, a favorite of one woman whose very special video recently gained quite a lot of attention, has been around for centuries — and it's free. (Assuming you have a dog.)
Brought to the masses by Vice's Desus & Mero, the unnamed woman's video begins with her in a park, standing next to her adorable dog. "Many of you have asked me how I always look so good, how my makeup always looks so perfect, or how I always have this natural glow," she says. It's at this point that you might realize she's holding a clear plastic cup, which makes the next thing she says all the more disturbing: "Here's my secret."
She leads her dog to a nearby tree and proceeds to collect the blissfully unaware pup's urine in the cup. (Hilariously, when you have captions on, musical notes are shown as a representation of the peeing sound.) Then, without any hesitation and no apparent video edits, the woman is shown bringing the cup to her lips and drinking the entire cup of dog piss.
When she's done, she says, "Until I first drank my dog's pee, I was depressed, I was sad, and I had really bad acne. Dog pee also has vitamin A in it, vitamin E in it, and it has 10 grams of calcium, and it's also proven to help cure cancer." OK, we've crossed over from gross to just plain wrong, so we asked an expert if there really are any benefits — beauty or otherwise — to drinking pooch tinkle.
"Drinking dog or human urine, otherwise known as 'urine therapy,' has been around for hundreds of years and has been practiced as a health therapy in ancient Egypt, Greece, and Rome. Urine is mostly made up of water, lots of urea, creatinine, various electrolytes, uric acid, trace proteins, and low levels of antibodies and enzymes." explains Joy McCarthy, a certified holistic nutritionist and definitely not a Pomeranian wearing a lab coat. "My take on this is there are far better ways to get healthy than drinking dog urine. For instance, drinking lemon and water to stimulate the gastric juices for better digestion or apple cider vinegar in water has been touted for everything from weight loss to detoxification effects. Both of these health habits are far tastier and safer than dog urine. Well, actually, I can't confirm that dog urine is not tasty." Allure did not ask her (or anyone else) to verify this, because ew.
Other than the presumably awful taste and horrified stares from the other humans at the dog park, there's also a health concern here. "Herbicides have been detected in dog's urine, likely from herbicide-treated lawns, antibiotics, and hormones, so I really don't know that it's the safest choice," explains McCarthy, who says there isn't really any solid research supporting the efficacy of drinking urine, canine or otherwise. "The only instance I can see when you may want to drink your dog's urine is if you were on a episode of Ultimate Survival Alaska and you couldn't find any safe drinking water."
If you want to see this for yourself for some strange reason, we've cued up the episode of Desus & Mero to the moment where they start incredulously watching, shouting things you'll probably shout, too, like "Nah. Nah. Nah. Nah! NAH! NAH!" Enjoy, dear readers.
Brought to the masses by Vice's Desus & Mero, the unnamed woman's video begins with her in a park, standing next to her adorable dog. "Many of you have asked me how I always look so good, how my makeup always looks so perfect, or how I always have this natural glow," she says. It's at this point that you might realize she's holding a clear plastic cup, which makes the next thing she says all the more disturbing: "Here's my secret."
She leads her dog to a nearby tree and proceeds to collect the blissfully unaware pup's urine in the cup. (Hilariously, when you have captions on, musical notes are shown as a representation of the peeing sound.) Then, without any hesitation and no apparent video edits, the woman is shown bringing the cup to her lips and drinking the entire cup of dog piss.
When she's done, she says, "Until I first drank my dog's pee, I was depressed, I was sad, and I had really bad acne. Dog pee also has vitamin A in it, vitamin E in it, and it has 10 grams of calcium, and it's also proven to help cure cancer." OK, we've crossed over from gross to just plain wrong, so we asked an expert if there really are any benefits — beauty or otherwise — to drinking pooch tinkle.
"Drinking dog or human urine, otherwise known as 'urine therapy,' has been around for hundreds of years and has been practiced as a health therapy in ancient Egypt, Greece, and Rome. Urine is mostly made up of water, lots of urea, creatinine, various electrolytes, uric acid, trace proteins, and low levels of antibodies and enzymes." explains Joy McCarthy, a certified holistic nutritionist and definitely not a Pomeranian wearing a lab coat. "My take on this is there are far better ways to get healthy than drinking dog urine. For instance, drinking lemon and water to stimulate the gastric juices for better digestion or apple cider vinegar in water has been touted for everything from weight loss to detoxification effects. Both of these health habits are far tastier and safer than dog urine. Well, actually, I can't confirm that dog urine is not tasty." Allure did not ask her (or anyone else) to verify this, because ew.
Other than the presumably awful taste and horrified stares from the other humans at the dog park, there's also a health concern here. "Herbicides have been detected in dog's urine, likely from herbicide-treated lawns, antibiotics, and hormones, so I really don't know that it's the safest choice," explains McCarthy, who says there isn't really any solid research supporting the efficacy of drinking urine, canine or otherwise. "The only instance I can see when you may want to drink your dog's urine is if you were on a episode of Ultimate Survival Alaska and you couldn't find any safe drinking water."
If you want to see this for yourself for some strange reason, we've cued up the episode of Desus & Mero to the moment where they start incredulously watching, shouting things you'll probably shout, too, like "Nah. Nah. Nah. Nah! NAH! NAH!" Enjoy, dear readers.
