New research reveals that the belief in moderate drinking’s health benefits is based on flawed studies.
These studies often compared drinkers to unhealthy former drinkers, skewing results. A deeper analysis of 107 studies found that higher quality research showed no longevity benefits from moderate drinking. Misconceptions like the “French paradox” contribute to this belief, despite health risks such as increased cancer risk. There is no safe level of alcohol consumption.
Questioning Conventional Wisdom
Probably everyone has heard the conventional wisdom that a glass of wine a day is good for you—or you’ve heard some variation of it. The problem is that it’s based on flawed scientific research, according to a new report in the Journal of Studies on Alcohol and Drugs.
Over the years, many studies have suggested that moderate drinkers enjoy longer lives with lower risks of heart disease and other chronic ills than abstainers do. That spurred the widespread belief that alcohol, in moderation, can be a health tonic. However, not all studies have painted such a rosy picture—and the new analysis sheds light on why.
“There is simply no completely ‘safe’ level of drinking.” Tim Stockwell, Ph.D.
Misleading Comparisons
In a nutshell, studies linking moderate drinking to health benefits suffer from fundamental design flaws, said lead researcher Tim Stockwell, Ph.D., a scientist with the Canadian Institute for Substance Use Research at the University of Victoria.
The major issue: Those studies have generally focused on older adults and failed to account for people’s lifetime drinking habits. So moderate drinkers were compared with “abstainer” and “occasional drinker” groups that included some older adults who had quit or cut down on drinking because they’d developed any number of health conditions.
“That makes people who continue to drink look much healthier by comparison,” Stockwell said.
And in this case, he noted, looks are deceiving.
Analyzing Data From 107 Studies
For the analysis, Stockwell and his colleagues identified 107 published studies that followed people over time and looked at the relationship between drinking habits and longevity. When the researchers combined all the data, it looked like light to moderate drinkers (that is, those who drank between one drink per week and two per day) had a 14% lower risk of dying during the study period compared with abstainers.
Things changed, however, when the investigators did a deeper dive. There were a handful of “higher quality” studies that included people who were relatively young at the outset (younger than 55, on average) and that made sure former and occasional drinkers were not considered “abstainers.” In those studies, moderate drinking was not linked to a longer life.
Instead, it was the “lower quality” studies (older participants, no distinction between former drinkers and lifelong abstainers) that did link moderate drinking to greater longevity.
“If you look at the weakest studies,” Stockwell said, “that’s where you see health benefits.”
The French Paradox
The notion that moderate drinking leads to a longer, healthier life goes back decades. As an example, Stockwell pointed to the “French paradox”—the idea, popularized in the 1990s, that red wine helps explain why the French enjoy relatively low rates of heart disease, despite a rich, fatty diet. That view of alcohol as an elixir still seems to be “ingrained” in the public imagination, Stockwell noted.
Health Risks of Moderate Drinking
In reality, he said, moderate drinking likely does not extend people’s lives—and, in fact, carries some potential health hazards, including increased risks of certain cancers. That’s why no major health organization has ever established a risk-free level of alcohol consumption.
“There is simply no completely ‘safe’ level of drinking,” Stockwell said.
Reference: “Why Do Only Some Cohort Studies Find Health Benefits From Low-Volume Alcohol Use? A Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis of Study Characteristics That May Bias Mortality Risk Estimates” by Tim Stockwell, Jinhui Zhao, James Clay, Christine Levesque and Nitika Sanger, 30 January 2024, Journal of Studies on Alcohol and Drugs.
DOI: 10.15288/jsad.23-00283
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6 Comments
Despite the best of efforts, the article describes a fatally flawed study that too-typically ignores a kind of food allergy reactions that mainstream medicine still fails to recognize, research, practice and/or teach (https://www.seleneriverpress.com/historical/nonreaginic-allergy-in-theory-and-practice/), official (e.g., FDA in the US) toxic food additive approvals since the late 1960s (US; http://www.holisticmed.com/msg/TheErbreportonMSGtotheWHO.pdf) and/or excessive related/resultant medical errors. So-called “Higher-quality” studies likely ensured that the cohorts were ingesting added soy processed with toxic hexane and artificially cultured “free” MSG most of their young (relative to me) lives. As to future studies including ‘smoking status,’ unless the allergy (food and/or tobacco), toxic food additive and medical error factors are included those too will be fatally flawed. Retrospectively, most if not all cohort studies already completed are questionable (at best) and/or invalid (at worst).
This article describes the survivor bias in lifestyle research. When you look at older people and a lifestyle risk, you are looking at a group that has selected out people who died from that risk. For example, you can find people who drank and smoked their entire lives and lived to be in their 90s, but they are the exception. It doesn’t mean smoking and drinking are safe, it just means these are the survivors, for whatever reason.
Also, it should be obvious that alcohol consumption is never good. Alcohol is a powerful solvent and irritant. It dissolves fats. So imagine what it does to the mucus membranes of the esophagus, stomach, liver, brain, heart, kidneys, and every cell membrane it touches. The problem is that alcohol is addictive, profitable, and has been institutionalized in our culture, with the government benefiting from taxing alcohol. The cost of medical care due to alcohol consumption is tremendous. So, essentially, alcohol is a poison that helps drive our economy. And we all know that money is more important than health in this culture.
Alcohol shouldn’t enter human elementary canal. Find its alternative to add to liquors.
Are you sure, skab? Auto-brewery syndrom (ABS): https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Auto-brewery_syndrome
I read the paper linked to this article and found several problems.
The essential problem is that there is no new factual evidence in this study.
It is a “meta-analysis” which is to say it is a second hand collection of original studies cherry picked based on a chosen criteria of quality.
There is nothing wrong with a re-examination of evidence with better analysis as such, but this particular exercise is sloppy.
Here’s an example: some of the chosen studies did not quantify the amount of alcohol consumed so the authors of this new paper invented evidence by using a formula based on average consumption in the country of origin. That’s speculation not science.
Results from the chosen studies were then combined using a weighted average, where the weights varied with the spread in the original data. What is the motivation for this arbitrary principle of integration?
On the question of bias, the authors cast doubt on studies funded by the alcohol industry while themselves being funded by a government with socialized medical care.
In short, this is junk science.
The remarks made by others are very valid and the only point I would reiterate is that the studies chosen to include in this meta-analysis, have been selected with the pre-perception that the results would be what they had theorised.