Can Drinking Wine Really Help You Live Longer? New Study Reveals

Drinking a glass of wine per day has always been linked to numerous health benefits. According to health experts, if one consumes wine in moderation it's good for health. As per the experts, a glass of wine per day should consist of 5 ounces (147 ml) of wine, not more than that. Women are recommended to have just one glass of wine per day and men can have two. The benefits of drinking wine in the recommended quantity provide antioxidants, prevent common cold, reduce the risks of gallstones and dementia, etc.

But the age-old belief that drinking a glass or 2 of wine benefits your health seems to be not so true. A new study carried out by the researchers from the Washington School of Medicine led to a new finding which states that even light drinkers who drink daily are at a 20% risk of premature death compared to those who drink thrice or less than that per week.

All About The Latest Research

The experiment was conducted by the researchers from the Washington School of Medicine, St. Louis with Sarah M. Hartz, as the lead researcher. The researchers analysed more than 400,000 people for this study who belonged to the age group of 18-85 years.

According to the findings by these researchers, drinking 1 or 2 glasses of wine around 4 or more times in a week is considered to be safe as per the existing guidelines. The consumption of alcohol in the recommended amounts has been linked with improving heart health by decreasing the risk of heart ailments, Matthew Solan, Executive Editor, Harvard Men's Health Watch stated in Harvard Health Blog, but the researchers of this study claim that it is associated with more health risks than health benefits.

The new study brought to light that drinking every day has the potential to trigger the risk of cancer, which eventually increases the risk of premature death. Drinking every day actually eliminates the health benefits it has and harms your health instead as it triggers cancer risk which makes you prone to premature death.

"It used to seem like having one or two drinks per day was no big deal, and there even have been some studies suggesting it can improve health," the lead researcher Sarah M. Hartz stated in the study.

"But now we know that even the lightest daily drinkers have an increased mortality risk," Hartz stated further.

How Was The Research Carried Out?

Two groups of people belonging to different age groups were analysed by the researchers in this population study:

-One group of partakers comprised of 340,668 people who belonged to the age group of 18 to 85 in the National Health Interview Survey (NHIS).

-The other group comprised of 93,653 people who were outpatients of 40 to 60 years of age at Veterans Administration clinics.

To Conclude...

The study concluded that there was a 20% spike in the death risk for people belonging to all age groups. These researchers stated that the number of deaths is comparatively fewer among people in their 20s and 30s, hence a 20% trigger is not that significant but it is noteworthy for the people who are 75 years old or more because they are already prone to death due to various causes and this 20% increase in the death risk would increase the number of deaths of people belonging to that age group.

"If you tailor medical recommendations to an individual person, there may be situations under which you would think that occasional drinking potentially could be helpful," Hartz stated.

"But overall, I do think people should no longer consider a glass of wine a day to somehow be healthy," she concluded.