We need more high-quality evidence to assess the health impacts of moderate alcohol consumption. And we need the media to treat the subject with the nuance it requires. The less alcohol you drink, the lower your risk for these health effects, including several types of cancer. Downstream reactions lead to the buildup of triglycerides – fats – that accumulate in the liver (alcoholic fatty liver). Continued alcohol consumption leads the immune system to attack liver cells (alcoholic hepatitis), and, finally, scarring the liver (cirrhosis).
Meanwhile, a study published last month showed that deaths related to excessive drinking are rising in the United States, especially among women. One major challenge in this field is the lack of large, long-term, high-quality studies. Moderate alcohol consumption has been studied in dozens of randomized controlled trials, but those trials have never tracked more than about 200 people for more than two years. The National Institutes of Health considers a half-ounce of alcohol – 13.7 grams – to constitute one drink. That’s what’s in a 12- ounce can of beer (5% alcohol), a 5-ounce glass of wine (12% alcohol) or a 1.5-ounce shot of hard liquor (40% alcohol). Binge drinking is behavior that raises blood alcohol levels to 0.08%.
Alcohol use disorder includes a level of drinking that’s sometimes called alcoholism. For people trying to cut down on drinking, Laing said she recommends balancing alcohol with nonalcoholic drinks, drinking slowly and consuming a meal before drinking. She often brings her own nonalcoholic beer or wine to social gatherings, Laing said, and most bartenders are happy to make a mocktail.
Risks of moderate alcohol use
As a result, drinking alcohol with meals may cut the rise in blood sugar by 16–37% more than water. Blood sugar between meals — known as fasting blood glucose — may also decline (51, 52). Many people facing anxiety and depression drink intentionally to does reese witherspoon have fetal alcohol syndrome reduce stress and improve mood. While drinking may provide a few hours of relief, it may worsen your overall mental health and spark a vicious cycle (23, 24). Liver diseases caused by alcohol consumption are collectively known as alcoholic liver diseases. The truth is that the health effects of alcohol vary between individuals and may depend on the amount and type of alcohol consumed.
NIAAA can help people find information and resources about AUD and treatments that might work best for them. A .gov website belongs to an official government organization in the United States. Transplant centers are seeing record numbers of liver transplant patients, and they’re arriving sicker than in the past. At UCHealth University of Colorado Hospital on the Anschutz Medical Campus, 80% to 90% of patients screened in 2023 needed transplants – roughly twice the prepandemic figure.
Deciding about drinking
Pancreatitis can be a short-term (acute) condition that clears up in a few days. But prolonged alcohol abuse can lead to chronic (long-term) pancreatitis, which can be severe. With continued alcohol use, steatotic liver disease can lead to liver fibrosis. Eventually, you can develop permanent and irreversible scarring in your liver, which is called cirrhosis. Clearly there are good reasons to discourage excessive alcohol consumption, driving drunk, and other avoidable alcohol-related trouble. These are more than just interesting questions for researchers to study.
Cancer
We have been researching the health effects of alcohol for a combined 60 years. Our work, and that of others, has shown that even modest alcohol consumption likely raises the risk for certain diseases, such as breast and esophageal cancer. But after countless studies, the data do not justify sweeping statements about the effects of moderate alcohol consumption on human health. Aragam co-authored a 2022 study that also found a trend of healthy lifestyle habits among light to moderate drinkers, but concluded nonetheless that any level of alcohol consumption increased the risk of cardiovascular disease.
Your body breaks alcohol down into a chemical called acetaldehyde, which damages your DNA. Damaged DNA can cause a cell to grow out of control, which results in cancerous tumors. Steatotic liver disease used to go by the name fatty liver disease. You probably already know that excessive drinking can affect you in more ways than one.
- In other words, some people may be harmed or helped more by alcohol consumption than others.
- It’s tempting to assume that because heavy alcohol consumption is very bad, lesser amounts must be at least a little bad.
- Alcohol is one of the most popular psychoactive substances in the world.
- WHO works with Member States and partners to prevent and reduce the harmful use of alcohol as a public health priority.
Surrogate and illegally produced alcohols can bring an extra health risk from toxic contaminants. Instead, much alcohol research is observational, meaning it follows large groups of drinkers and abstainers over time. But observational studies cannot prove cause-and-effect because moderate drinkers differ in many ways from non-drinkers and heavy drinkers—in diet, exercise, and smoking habits, for instance. Observational studies can still yield useful information, but they also require researchers to gather data about when and how the alcohol is consumed, since alcohol’s effect on health depends heavily on drinking patterns. Observational studies can still yield useful information, but they also require researchers to gather data about when and how the alcohol is consumed, since alcohol’s effect on health depends heavily on drinking patterns.
The owners of the hostel, which is now closed, have previously denied serving illicit alcohol, the BBC reported. While there is no one-size-fits-all method for recovering from AUD, there are lots of effective treatment options. Some examples include behavioral treatments, support groups, and FDA-approved medications.
Light drinkers may have been better educated, wealthier, more physically active, better insured, and benefitting from better diets. More recent research has adjusted for those sorts of factors and found no protective effect from alcohol consumption in terms of longevity and elevated risk of hypertension and coronary artery disease with each progressive drink. “The good news is that earlier stages of steatotic liver disease are usually completely reversible in about four to six weeks if you abstain from drinking alcohol,” Dr. Sengupta assures. Drinking moderately if you’re otherwise healthy may be a risk you’re willing to take.