[acb-hsp] Moderate Drinkers Healthier than Teetotlers?

[peter altschul]

So What Does it Mean that Studies Reveal that Moderate Drinkers 
Are Healthier than Teetotalers?
  Anneli Rufus, Alterationet November 28, 2011
  We know too much drinking can be hazardous to our health.  But 
new research suggests that drinking too little might be 
hazardous, too.
  I don't want to go to rehab, but a raft of recent studies show 
that moderate alcohol consumption lowers our risks for many dire 
conditions including heart disease, stroke, gallstones, diabetes 
and dementia.  Some studies even suggest that the answer to pesky 
menopause symptoms comes in six-packs and goes great with 
pretzels.
  The keyword here is "moderate." Some studies define this as one 
drink per week; others as up to four drinks per day.  This 
haziness notwithstanding, these studies show that heavy drinkers 
are far more likely than moderate drinkers to die from certain 
diseases.  But so are people who don't drink at all.
  It's a bell curve.  But while one half of the bell is well, 
duh, the other half -- the half involving abstinence -- is pretty 
shocking.  In study after study, abstainers get sick and die 
sooner and in larger numbers than moderate drinkers.
  In these studies, "you get this protective effect no matter 
what you drink: wine, beer or liquor," says nutrition therapist 
Karen Scheuner.  Absinthe, beaujolais, King Cobra: It's all good 
-- or good for you.
  "The benefits don't increase with amount," Scheuner says, "and 
they disappear altogether if you consume four or more drinks per 
day."
  A study published this summer found that women who consume one 
drink daily and men who consume two drinks daily are 23 percent 
less likely than nondrinkers to develop Alzheimer's disease.  
Heavy drinkers, defined here as consumers of at least three to 
five drinks daily, face higher Alzheimer's risks than both 
moderate drinkers and abstainers.  (Well, duh.)
  And a study published in Annals of Internal Medicine found 
that, compared to abstinence, drinking one to three alcoholic 
beverages daily is associated with a 33 to 56 percent lower 
incidence of diabetes -- and imbibing over three drinks daily is 
associated with a 43 percent higher incidence of diabetes.  (Duh 
again.)
  A study presented two months ago at the European Respiratory 
Society Annual Congress found that both abstainers and heavy 
drinkers are nearly one and a half times as likely to develop 
asthma as are moderate drinkers, defined here as consumers of one 
to six alcoholic beverages per week.  Abstainers face the highest 
asthma risk of all, topping even that of heavy drinkers.
  A 2007 study found that drinking at least one alcoholic 
beverage daily is associated with a 30-percent lower risk than 
abstinence of developing one type of kidney cancer.  But its 
authors warn that alcohol consumption -- light, heavy and 
moderate -- is linked with increased rates of breast cancer, 
liver cancer, oral cancer, esophageal cancer and other cancers.  
I don't like those odds.
  A study published in the New England Journal of Medicine that 
tracked over 22,000 men for more than 12 years found that those 
who regularly consumed as little as one drink a week had a lower 
stroke risk than did abstainers.  A study published in the 
Journal of Urology that tracked over 120,000 men found that those 
who regularly consumed at least 1.3 ounces of alcohol daily -- 
about half as much as is found in your average Manhattan -- had a 
35-percent lower risk than abstainers did of developing prostatic 
hyperplasia, whose symptoms include incontinence and a wide array 
of other urinary woes.  Other recent studies found moderate 
drinkers facing significantly less risk than abstainers for 
macular degeneration, arthritis, osteoporosis -- and even death 
itself.
  A 2010 study found that abstainers' all-cause mortality rate is 
twice as high as that of moderate drinkers.  Examining death 
rates among middle-aged people, this study also found a 70 
percent higher mortality rate for heavy drinkers than for 
moderate drinkers.  So does abstaining mean you'll die that much 
sooner than both your social-drinker, daiquiri-a-day ex and 
alcoholic Uncle Joe, who blacks out in alleyways? Is life unfair?
  The trouble with scientifically studying alcohol consumption is 
that drinking habits are intertwined with countless variables 
that have less to do with physiology than with lifestyle, 
demographics and class -- and even intelligence.  What else is 
happening in the lives of those who drink nothing, a little or a 
lot? "People who are at lower risk for the diseases related to 
moderate alcohol consumption are also following these general 
guidelines as it relates to healthy behaviors: moderation, 
balance and variety," Scheuner says.  "They likely also exercise 
in moderation, sleep the 'right' amount, eat a balanced and 
varied healthy diet that includes moderate alcohol, and keep 
their stress levels in a healthy range."
  A Danish study investigating drinking patterns -- as opposed to 
quantities -- found that women who drink alcohol on at least one 
day per week have a lower risk of heart disease than women who 
drink less frequently.  But the study's authors found that 
"unhealthy traits (smoking and a low intake of fruit and 
vegetables) were common at both extremes of drinking frequency" 
-- that is, common among both abstainers and heavy drinkers.
  Sometimes the health benefits clearly come down to chemistry.  
Alcohol consumption increases heart-healthy high-density 
lipoprotein cholesterol, aka "good cholesterol." Alcohol 
consumption also protects against heart disease by lowering 
levels of fibrinogen, a plasma involved in blood clotting.  
Studies show that resveratrol, an antioxidant found in red wine, 
protects the heart and slows the aging process.  Still more 
studies associate a hops-derived phytoestrogen with lower 
incidence of hot flashes, leading some to consider beer a natural 
menopause treatment.
  Throughout history, alcoholic beverages have been used as 
medicine.  Hippocrates recommended wine as a diuretic, sedative 
and fever reducer.  Medieval Europeans quaffed huge quantities of 
gin and other spirits, believing this might stave off the Black 
Plague.  Liquor-based "patent medicines" were an American 
frontier mainstay; one popular brand, Hostetter's Bitters, 
contained 43 percent alcohol.
  The 18th-century French monks who distilled 100 herbs, flowers 
and secret ingredients into Chartreuse called it an elixir 
vÁggcgggÁggcggtal.  In 1903, Britain's royal physician 
commissioned a London distillery to create a beverage that could 
"warm and revivify" King Edward VII, who was susceptible to 
colds.  The result was a lustrously silky-spicy liqueur, the 
King's Ginger, still used by the royal family.  Our 
snake-oil-swigging ancestors weren't altogether idiots.
  Alcoholism kills in a thousand ways.  But somewhere in that 
borderland between avoidance and indulgence is a sweet spot  And 
at this point in history, science doesn't really know why