Research Can drinking alcohol be good for your health?

How healthy is alcohol

Alcohol is unhealthy - right? How much can one drink without having a guilty conscience? Researchers have studied the influence of alcohol on the cardiovascular system and come to amazing results.

contents

• How healthy is alcohol
• The study
• The result
• Conclusion

The study

The Civil Service Department, based in London, has conducted a large-scale study on the effects of alcohol consumption. The long-term study has already recorded the health data of almost ten thousand subjects in 1988 and has since been regularly studied. Thus, the study is considered to be the most robust currently available research ever on the effects of alcohol on human health.

The result

A glass of red wine in the evening is better than abstinence. Specifically, the researchers have studied, for example, the influence on dementia and found that drinking at the age of 30 to 50 years can not increase the risk of dementia in old age. However, the study was not adjusted to those abstainers who were not allowed to drink alcohol due to pre-existing conditions and thus already had an increased risk of dementia from the outset.

Important: If anything, only moderate consumption helps. This is defined as one to 14 alcohol units per week, the upper limit being about one and a half bottles of wine. In general, wine is considered to be healthier than, for example, beer. According to the researchers, abstainers had a 45 percent increased risk of developing dementia early in life. The exact reason for this, however, is not yet known.

It is believed that moderate alcohol consumption protects against cardio-metabolic diseases such as diabetes and hypertension, which in turn is considered a dementia risk factor. That was already known before. What is new is that abstinence seems to be a true risk factor for dementia. However, heavy and regular alcohol consumption also increases the risk of dementia three-fold.

Conclusion

The team itself is careful with its conclusion. Study leader Dara O'Neill says about the results of her work: "Disturbances in alcohol consumption should be recognized as a major risk factor for all forms of dementia." The director of the British Heart Foundation, Victoria Taylor, warns against alcohol as a dementia. "With moderate alcohol consumption, the pros and cons balance. But there are far safer ways to prevent heart disease and dementia. For example, healthy eating and regular exercise. "(Fs)