London, April 3: The idea that drinking eight glasses of water a day is good for your health has been dismissed as a myth.

Scientists say there is no evidence drinking large amounts of water is beneficial for the average healthy person, and do not even know how this widely held belief came about. Specialists in kidney conditions in America reviewed research on claims that eight 8oz glasses of water help flush toxins from the body, preventing weight gain and improving skin tone.

Dan Negoianu and Stanley Goldfarb, of the Renal, Electrolyte and Hypertension Division at the University of Pennsylvania, said no single study indicated average healthy people needed to drink this amount of water — a total of 3.3 pints — each day.

“Indeed, it is unclear where this recommendation came from,” they say in the Journal of the American Society of Nephrology.