That glass or two of wine every night isn’t improving your health.
After decades of confusing and sometimes contradictory research, the picture becomes clearer: even small amounts of alcohol can have health consequences.
Research published in November found that between 2015 and 2019, heavy drinking resulted in approximately 140,000 deaths a year in the United States, most from chronic conditions such as liver disease, cancer and heart disease.
“The risk starts to rise well below levels where people would think, ‘Wow, that person has an alcohol problem,'” said Tim Naimi, director of the Canadian Institute for Substance Use Research at the Victoria University.
“Excessive use of alcohol,” based on the US Dietary Guidelines, is more than two drinks a day for men and more than one drink a day for women. There is also emerging evidence “that there are risks even within these levels, especially for certain cancers and some forms of cardiovascular disease,” said Marissa Esser, who directs the alcohol program at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. from USA.
And if you abstain from drinking Monday through Thursday and have two or three drinks on the weekend, those drinks count as binge drinking. It’s both the drinks accumulated over time and the amount of alcohol in your system at any given time that can cause harm.
When you drink alcohol, your body metabolizes it into acetaldehyde, a chemical that is toxic to cells. Acetaldehyde “damages your DNA and prevents your body from repairing the damage,” Esser explained. “Once DNA is damaged, a cell can grow out of control and create a cancerous tumor.”
Alcohol also creates oxidative stress, another form of DNA damage that can be particularly damaging to the cells that line the inside of blood vessels. Oxidative stress can lead to hardened arteries, resulting in higher blood pressure and coronary heart disease.
Previous research suggested that alcohol raises HDL, the “good” cholesterol, and that resveratrol, an antioxidant found in grapes (and red wine), has heart-protective properties.
However, said Mariann Piano, a professor of nursing at Vanderbilt University in Tennessee, “there has been a lot of recent evidence that has really challenged the notion of any kind of what we call a cardioprotective or salutary effect of alcohol.”
The idea that a low dose of alcohol was heart-healthy likely stemmed from the fact that people who drink small amounts tend to have other healthy habits, such as exercising, eating lots of fruits and vegetables, and not smoking. More recent research shows that even low levels of drinking slightly raise the risk of high blood pressure and heart disease. Alcohol is also linked to an abnormal heart rhythm that raises the risk of blood clots and strokes.
Alcohol is known to be a direct cause of seven different cancers: head and neck cancers (oral cavity, pharynx, and larynx), esophageal cancer, liver cancer, breast cancer, and colorectal cancer. Research suggests there may be a link between alcohol and other types of cancer, including prostate and pancreatic cancer, although the evidence is less clear. For some types of cancer, such as liver and colorectal cancer, the risk begins only when people drink to excess. But for breast and esophageal cancer, the risk increases, albeit slightly, with any alcohol consumption.
The single most common cause of alcohol-related death in the US is alcoholic liver disease, which kills about 22,000 people a year. It has three stages: alcoholic fatty liver, when fat accumulates in the organ; alcoholic hepatitis, when inflammation begins; and alcoholic cirrhosis, or scar tissue. The first two stages are reversible if you stop drinking completely; the third no.
Not everyone who drinks will develop these conditions, but even cutting back on alcohol a bit can be beneficial.
Light daily drinkers could also benefit from cutting back a bit. Try a few nights without alcohol: “If you feel better, your body is trying to tell you something,” said George Koob, director of the US National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism.
Naimi’s general advice: “Drink less, live more”.
By: Dana G. Smith
BBC-NEWS-SRC: http://www.nytsyn.com/subscribed/stories/6543905, IMPORTING DATE: 2023-01-24 22:50:07
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