Why is it lethal to inject pure water into a humans circulatory system?

Answer 1

Because of a thing call osmosis. If you place a permeable (one which will allow the slow leackage of water but not solids) membrane between two containers and fill one with pure water and the other with salty water so that they were both up to the same level. Then with time the salty container would fill up more at the expense of the fresh water side. Nature likes equal concentrations of saltyness and as the salt can not move acriss the membrane, fresh water leaks form the fresh water side to try and make the salty side more dilute.

Blood is slightly saline (salty) and in balance with the saltiness of the tissues and cells in the body. If you were to dilute the blood by injecting pure water, then the cells would start to to fill up with more water (because of osmosis) and they would burst, causing alot of damage to the body. That is why intravenous water is a slaine solution made to be the same osmotic salinity as blood.

Answer 2

Injecting pure water into the blood stream can be lethal if it is done in a high enough dosage and goes untreated. By injecting pure water into the system you weaken the solution of salts in the blood plasma (liquid outside of blood cells). This results in blood cells using osmosis to equalize the relative amount of salts outside and inside the cell, and the cell does this by pumping water into itself. If the difference in solutions outside and inside the cell is significant enough the cell will pump water into itself until it ruptures and dies. If this happens on a large scale it can be lethal.

Answer 3

Because the persons cells would burst (hypotonic) Because the persons cells would burst (hypotonic) Because the persons cells would burst (hypotonic)