In the summer of 2017 I was at a workshop in Vancouver where we met a Medical Geneticist who taught me some surprising things about alcohol and health. Medical Geneticists are MD’s who diagnose and manage people with hereditary (genetic) disorders. Due to the nature of treating rare diseases, geneticists spend a good deal of time researching the medical literature. The fellow we met in Vancouver was no exception and he used his knowledge to bust my small-amounts-of-alcohol-are-healthy bubble.
Like many of you I’m sure, I’ve believed for some time that scientific evidence showed one drink a day for women and two drinks a day for men reduces risk for heart disease and death in general. It turns out the studies that found moderate alcohol consumption to be healthy are fundamentally flawed. Canadian researchers recently published a study reviewing 87 papers on alcohol and came to the conclusion even small amounts of alcohol are unhealthy.
As with all research, the devil is in the details. Most of the moderate-alcohol-is-healthy research compares so called “abstainers” to moderate drinkers. It turns out that most of the studies used abstainers that were once drinkers who gave up drinking due to ill health. In other words, the health of moderate drinkers has been compared to people who gave up drinking because they got sick. Abstainers in most of the research had poorer health than the moderate drinking group which made it look like the moderate drinking group was getting a benefit from drinking small amounts of alcohol.
When researchers compare moderate drinkers to abstainers of equal health the results clearly show that alcohol increases your risk for a variety of disorders including anxiety, depression, liver disease, various types of cancer, suicide, violence and accidental injury. Even moderate alcohol consumption has no health benefits, shortens your life and increases your risk of heart disease. I know, what a bummer! With the holiday season upon us and alcohol flowing more freely than at other times of year, if you decide to drink please don’t do it thinking you are improving your health.
