Sunday, September 23, 2018

How Much Alcohol is Beneficial for Health?


One of the most controversial topics in wellness is the topic of alcoholic beverages and whether or not they can be helpful or harmful.     As with many things – the devil is in the details.    One thing is for sure – alcoholic beverages can be very harmful to your health if consumed in excess.      In fact, some researchers contend there is no safe level of alcohol intake.  So the big question is how much is too much? 

To answer that question let’s review what the research shows for alcohol intake and cardiovascular health.   

There is a considerable body of evidence showing that light to moderate drinking may help reduce the risk of coronary artery disease.     Now light to moderate means 1 – 2 drinks per day (1 – 2 beers, 1 – 2 glasses of wine, and best to stay completely clear of hard liquor!).       By the way a glass of wine means 5 ounces of wine and for stronger wines maybe more like 3 – 5 ounces.     Same deal with beer – it is all about alcohol content so for really high alcohol beers one is better than two!

According to a recent review light drinking as described above is associated with reduced risk of:

Coronary Artery Disease
Stroke caused by a reduction in blood supply
Heart Failure

Heavier drinking is associated with increased risk of:

High Blood Pressure
Coronary Artery Disease
Heart Rhythm Abnormalities
Brain bleeding type stroke

In this review authors speculated on several mechanisms that may be responsible for the benefits of light drinking:

Alcohol is known to raise HDL – good cholesterol

Low levels of alcohol reduce platelet aggravation meaning thinning the blood slightly.    This can help with coronary artery disease and stroke from loss of blood supply, but this can be very problematic if you are taking any medication to thin your blood like warfarin or coumarin.   Also, be aware that many dietary supplements also thin your blood slightly including, but not limited to, omega-3 fatty acids, many herbs and even vegetables like celery with higher intake.

The Authors also point out that low levels of alcohol intake are associated with decreased psychosocial stress.   This is all well and good, but we all need to keep in mind that it is very easy to develop a substance abuse problem with alcohol, so it is very important that certain people NOT drink at all.

Alcohol and the Brain

There have been several recent and very extensive reviews on this important subject.    One of these studies did a comprehensive review of alcohol and brain health and disease risk.     The review shows that there is clearly a very distinct dose response to alcohol separating health benefits from increased health risks as pointed out above.   This is specifically true for alcohol and Alzheimer’s disease.    To quote the authors “Moderate drinking of 3 – 4 glases per day of red wine was associated with a fourfold lower risk of Alzheimer’s".    Despite this they made it clear that this is NOT a suggestion for people to start drinking wine!

Red wine is a unique beverage in that it contains many plant chemicals that are clearly beneficial to health including polyphenols which work to reduce free radicals and inflammation and also chelate excess iron from the body.

Negative impacts of Alcohol and Mental Health

Unfortunately, excess alcohol intake is very bad for the brain.   For anyone who is depressed or has a mental health disorder like being Bipolar – alcohol can literally kill them by exacerbating symptoms and mood swings.

Alcohol lowers inhibitions and clouds judgement which can dramatically increase risk taking behavior with all the associated consequences.

Heavier drinking shrinks the brain.

Excess alcohol intake depletes key vitamins and minerals including:

Folic Acid – this dramatiacally increase breast cancer risk in females and any woman who drinks regularly (even lightly) should consider supplementing with an active form of folic acid such as L-methylfolate (5-MTHF).   In fact alcohol depletes all b-vitamins which are crucial for mental and physical health!

Vitamin C

Magnesium

Zinc

Iron - this depletion can be very problematic for woman who are mentruating and drink regularly and are also vegetarians since there iron intake from foods is almost non-existent in many cases.

Potassium - as with magensium depletion of this vital mineral helps drive the blood pressure increasing effects of excess alcohol intake.

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