This decade's high colonic, I guess

"High colonics" must have started as an American, middle-class-to-rich person's health fad in the late 1980's, I would say, given that it was well known enough to feature as a joke in Steve Martin's amusing 1991 movie LA Story.

You don't hear much about them anymore, and I see from this article in the New York Times that the new thing for the person with too much money is IV drip therapy.   (Maybe its been around for a while and it's just me who hasn't noticed.)   From the article:

IV drip therapy was first popularized about a decade ago as a novelty reserved for vacations and bachelorette parties, but it has since become embedded in the wellness sphere. The 30-to-45-minute treatments cost anywhere from $100 to $1,000, depending on the concoction and provider, and have been embraced by the Hollywood elite — Gwyneth Paltrow, Chrissy Teigen and Harry Styles have all partaken. Today, IV drip therapy is a staple at medical spas, resort hotels and strip malls. Some companies even make house calls.

And over the last several months, a handful of high-end residential buildings in Los Angeles, Miami and Manhattan began offering the treatments in house, allowing tenants to make them a core feature of their personal wellness routine.

At the Park, which started offering the service at the end of 2023, tenants can schedule an IV drip in their apartment or in a treatment room where they can also book massages, Botox or fillers.

“If you are a healthy person, you really can’t do it too often, unless you’re doing it three or four times a day,” said Danielle Remington, director of events and partnerships at Drip Hydration, the service provider for the Park.

Drip Hydration and other providers market their formulas as elixirs that can improve sleep and mental clarity, brighten your skin and boost your athletic performance. However, there is scant scientific research to bolster these claims. Critics argue that at best, IV drips are a wildly overpriced alternative to drinking a glass of water, and at worst, they could harm people with underlying health conditions like kidney disease or hypertension. In 2018, Kendall Jenner was hospitalized after a bad reaction to an IV drip. And last year, a woman died after receiving IV drip therapy at Luxe Med Spa in Wortham, Texas; its medical director’s license was later temporarily restricted by the state’s medical board.

Not good.