One of the most contentious issues in the vast literature about alcohol consumption has been the consistent finding that those who don’t drink tend to die sooner than those who do. The standard Alcoholics Anonymous explanation for this finding is that many of those who show up as abstainers in such research are actually former hard-core drunks who had already incurred health problems associated with drinking.
I can’t access the actual paper so am not sure of the groups they used but my stock response is “correlation does not equal causation”
My entire professional life I have been surrounded by heavy drinkers who also happen to be gym going sports nuts with top of the line health care and the disposable income necessary to maintain very good diets. I appreciate drinking is common across all income levels but I do wonder if the true effects of drinking are being masked by other factors.
Yeah, I think socio-economics is a factor. I remember being in Florida and reading that the wealthiest county in the state, also had the highest alchoholism rate. This was Sarasota county, and after spending time there, it always appeared to me that rich folks retired to Sarasota, and had nothing else to do but hang out and drink with each other. Another point I wonder about is weight, as a lot of alkies were thin, unlike the std American.
Could the ‘drink of choice’ of this socioeconomic category be a factor as well? I assume these Sarasotans aren’t drinking Coors Light by the 24-pack, and thus aren’t getting all the sugar etc. If they’re drinking $150 bottles of scotch, they’re obviously getting just as drunk as ‘joe six pack’ but without a lot of the other unhealthy aspects.
For what its worth, this study deals with folks later in life . . . those 55- 65 years old. It doesn’t really make any claims about heavy drinking regarding the general population (other ages).
One could postulate that many of the heaviest drinkers, never make it to 55.
There was one plausible explanation in the article. One of the strongest predictors of having a long, healthy life is an active, healthy social life. Drinking is usually a social activity. There’s no question that alcohol lubricates social interaction.
drinking up to 14 glasses of alcohol a week can be beneficial, especially if it is red wine. The stats change when the consumption increases.
Red wine is good for your heart and contrains reservatrol which can inhibit cancer cell proliferatioin.
No. Take a guess, how many bottles of red wine would one have to drink before consuming enough reservatrol to see an affect? (a clinically proven affect of reservatrol, that is).
One of the statements from the Time article is this: “heavy drinkers are less likely to die than don’t drink,” Hmmm, isn’t everyone going to die?
As I read the abstract . . .
It seems that the statistical significance occurs when comparing the moderate to the abstainers, and when comparing the heavy to the moderate. (The moderate category shows a lower rate in both comparisons.)
While the rate for abstainers (51%) is higher than the heavy category (45%), the abstract fails to mention this difference as being statistically significant WHEN COMPARED TO EACH OTHER. And, considering these amounts, they probably aren’t. Furthermore, I would assume is that if the heavy to abstainer comparison WAS statistically significant they surely would have said so.
“No. Take a guess, how many bottles of red wine would one have to drink before consuming enough reservatrol to see an affect? (a clinically proven affect of reservatrol, that is).”
Red wine does indeed offer much less resveratrol than is typically contained in resveratrol supplements, but it seems to me that that only suggests that even a little resveratrol can be highly beneficial, if taken over a period of years. Since it’s very hard to get good bioavailability for resveratrol, one might also speculate whether the red wine in resveratrol is more bioavailable for some reason. In any case, it has long been speculated that resveratrol may play a role in the longer lifespan associated with the Mediterranean diet (including red wine).
Personally, I’ve never been able to acquire a taste for alcohol, but I take resveratrol daily. Of course, over time scientists may find other beneficial nutrients in alcoholic drinks as well.
I’m not saying that reservatrol can cure cancer. The kinase that it activates has many downstream targets with long lasting effects on gene transcription. Reservatrol slows the growth of cancer cells and while it obviously can’t cure diseases, maybe it could keep cancers sub-clinical? More men die with prostate cancer than die of prostate cancer.
No. Take a guess, how many bottles of red wine would one have to drink before consuming enough reservatrol to see an affect? (a clinically proven affect of reservatrol, that is).
I’m pretty sure it’s not the reservatrol that causes the affect, I think that’s the alcohol.
