A Sober Look at Death From Drinking
A recent article in The Atlantic points to a study in Italy that makes the somewhat obvious point that drinking is bad for your health. The article starts out:
“A number of studies in the past few years have suggested health benefits from drinking small or moderate amounts of alcohol. This can encourage people to look at alcohol almost as if it’s medicine. A recent study of alcohol use in Italy paints a much more sobering picture.
“Death rates from infections, diabetes, diseases of the immunological, nervous, cardiovascular, respiratory, and digestive systems, and violent causes all were elevated, as were death rates from many types of cancer. And while women in the study fared better than men, they still fared worse than the rest of the population.
“It’s hardly news that alcoholismis bad for the health. But few studies have examined these effects in such detail and in such a large population.”
Read the entire article HERE
France has one of the world’s highest rates of cirrhosis of the liver. The myth of moderate, wine-drinking Mediterranean peoples is largely just that – a myth.
Interesting, though the article actually doesn’t talk much about the Italian study results. Not too surprising, I’ve heard health care pros say over and over again that alcohol is probably the most physically damaging addictive drug around, with negative impacts on pretty much every part of your body that get worse and worse as you drink more heavily.