New Research Has Us Asking: Is Drinking in Moderation Ever Healthy?
But many of the studies that sold moderate drinking as a healthy habit were faulty, according to new research published last Thursday in the Journal of Studies on Alcohol and Drugs.
“This was a systematic review that touches on this one question of whether alcohol in moderation is good for you, which is an idea many people hold,” Tim Stockwell, PhD, a researcher at the Canadian Institute for Substance Abuse Research at the University of Victoria and author of the new report, told Well+Good.
- Brad Lander, PhD, clinical psychologist specializing in addiction medicine
- Tim Stockwell, PhD, researcher at the Canadian Institute for Substance Abuse Research at the University of Victoria
The bottom line, according to Dr. Stockwell? Drinking, even in moderation, does not offer health benefits. His analysis adds to a growing number of reports showing “you live longer if you drink less at whatever level you’re drinking.”
Dr. Stockwell and his team reviewed 107 published studies that compared moderate drinkers to abstainers. On the surface, many of them presented alcohol in a good light; moderate drinkers were often less likely than abstainers to die during the study period. But when the team compared the findings of the low- and high-quality studies included in the review, they found that only the former yielded these results.
The low-quality studies were labeled as such for a couple different reasons. In some cases, the authors of these studies categorized “abstainers” as people who didn’t drink at the time the research was conducted, even if they had been moderate or heavy drinkers for years before that point. In other cases, the authors of these low-quality studies only included elderly study participants. Comparing moderate drinkers to elderly people or people who drank heavily in the past isn’t exactly fair—and likely skewed the findings.
The high-quality studies—which included participants who were, on average, younger than 55 and didn’t label former drinkers as abstainers—found that abstainers were not, in fact, more likely to die during the study period.
We hate to be a buzzkill, but this research points to a growing trend. To date, alcohol has been linked to an increased risk of heart and liver diseases; some mental health conditions; as well as cancers of the liver, breast, mouth, colon, rectum, and more.
But it’s not all doom and gloom. Having a nightly glass of wine won’t necessarily dramatically increase your risk of early death. “It’s a small risk,” Dr. Stockwell said. “If you drink one drink a day, your mortality risk is about the same as smoking one cigarette a day.”
But studies like his have made it impossible to ignore the fact that alcohol is not good for your body, full stop.
“It’s not a healthy thing to do in any respect,” Brad Lander, PhD, a clinical psychologist specializing in addiction medicine, who was not involved with the new report, told Well+Good.
If you’re asking yourself if you should try completely abstaining from alcohol, you’re not alone: Research shows many younger people are drinking considerably less than previous generations. But there’s no one-size-fits-all answer to that question, Dr. Lander said. In considering it, people should factor in their risk of diseases linked to alcohol use and how much they usually drink.
“I think it’s also important to look at whether you really want to drink, since sometimes people drink out of habit or expectation,” Dr. Lander said.
Ultimately, there’s enough evidence to say alcohol is bad for you and doesn’t offer health benefits. What’s less clear at this time, is whether it’s bad enough for everyone to avoid at all costs.
—reviewed by Jennifer Logan, MD, MPH
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