The US public health establishment buries overwhelming evidence that abstinence is a cause of heart disease and early death. People deserve to know that alcohol gives most of us a higher life expectancy - even if consumed above recommended limits.
Selected quotes from the article:
The Research Society on Alcoholism - as its name suggests, not a group predisposed to say good things about alcohol - published a review in 2008 concluding “A considerable body of epidemiology associates moderate alcohol consumption with significantly reduced risks of coronary heart disease and, albeit currently a less robust relationship, cerebrovascular (ischemic) stroke.” It went further, reviewing a range of biological “evidence that moderate alcohol levels can exert direct neuroprotective actions.”
The RSA review also noted: “In over half of nearly 45 reports since the early 1990s, significantly reduced risks of cognitive loss or dementia in moderate, nonbinge consumers of alcohol (wine, beer, liquor) have been observed.”
“The overall death rates were lowest among men and women reporting about one drink daily. Mortality from all causes increased with heavier drinking, particularly among adults under age 60 with lower risk of cardiovascular disease.”
If you still ask why I, an addiction/public health specialist, feel it necessary to point out alcohol’s benefits, recall some facts reviewed here:
* Well-informed Americans are often remarkably ignorant about the benefits of moderate drinking and think that abstinence is better for them.
* The US is not a heavy-drinking nation, yet its health outcomes are poor compared with other economically-advanced nations.
* The worst drinking pattern is frequent binge-drinking, yet many Americans engage in such drinking (certainly young Americans), while thinking daily-but-moderate drinking is a sign of addiction.
* In treatment and prevention, the American abstinence/just-say-no fixation can lead to tenuous, unrealistic efforts to abstain, efforts at which people frequently fail, only to engage in the highest-risk forms of binge consumption.
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