5 ms·

Depends on the quantity I guess, but... why is drinking 4-5 times a week not ok? Something like a glass of wine or a small beer should be fine, right? In some c

Depends on the quantity I guess, but... why is drinking 4-5 times a week not ok? Something like a glass of wine or a small beer should be fine, right? In some countries (e.g. France) it's a wide-spread habit to drink a glass of wine at lunch, and it doesn't seem to harm public health.

tonyedgecombe 8y ago
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2003/oct/27/worlddispatch.france https://www.theguardian.com/world/2003/oct/27/worlddispatch.... "The findings reveal that the widespread perception of the French as a healthy nation is rapidly becoming outdated."
- dnate 8y ago
  > "We're not proponents of complete abstinence. There probably is an amount of drinking that's OK," LoConte told NPR in June. "But from a cancer-prevention standpoint, drinking the least amount of alcohol possible would be the best strategy." I always found defending your drinking with the "a glass of wine a day is good for your heart" study a bit lame. But advocating abstinence because no level of alcohol is safe is very narrow minded as well.
  - Retric 8y ago
    Saying something is ok in moderation always defines moderation relative to the harm. This study puts moderation very low ~1-2 glasses of wine a month. Studies focused on different forms of harm have different thresholds, but you get all forms of harm not just what a specific study looks at. Saying I accept the harm for this benefit is fine, but pretending it does not exist is irrational.
    - virgilp 8y ago
      Do you have the study? Not some newspaper articles. It feels very unlikely to me that they were able to prove harm from 3 glasses a month, I'd like to read that. [edit] In the article cited in NPR, https://www.thelancet.com/action/showPdf?pii=S0140-6736%2818%2931310-2 https://www.thelancet.com/action/showPdf?pii=S0140-6736%2818... , which makes the claim "zero consumption minimises risk", you can see that ischemic heart disease & diabetes risks actually go down for 1 glass a day, while cancer & tuberculosis go slightly up. Their own chart of "relative weighted risk from all attributable causes" is flat-line for the first 1 glass/day. And that's from the paper that's cited to say "no level of alcohol consumption is safe!"
      - Retric 8y ago
        We are looking at different studies. This is the meta analysis I am referring to: “Every category of drinking was associated with an increased risk of cancer.” https://www.researchgate.net/publication/268874745_Alcohol_consumption_and_site-specific_cancer_risk_A_comprehensive_dose-response_meta-analysis https://www.researchgate.net/publication/268874745_Alcohol_c... PS: The study included what it called light drinking as a cancer risk. I am less generous with terminology.
        virgilp 8y ago
        Look at the "light drinking"[] result in figure 2 - most whiskers cross the 1.0 line when it's not downright in the left-hand side! (e.g. lung cancer relative risk - if you trust that result, it means light drinking _improves_ your lung cancer prospects). They flat out state that lymphoma risk is inversely correlated with drinking. AND it's only about cancer - no word about other diseases (e.g. ischemic heart disease, where there are studies showing light wine drinking improve your odds). Overall, your meta-study hardly proves that "any quantity of alcohol is bad for your health"; quite the contrary in fact, I'd say. [] 1 glass of wine a day according to their definition.
        Retric 8y ago
        You are ignoring what the paper actually says. Each cancer type is independently analyzed independently. 1 wine a day measurably increases overal cancer risks as stated by the authors. Rather than assuming you have a better understanding after a quick analysis you may want to rethink your analysis. Hint the base rate for each cancer is not equivalent.
        virgilp 8y ago
        > 1 wine a day measurably increases overal cancer risks as stated by the authors. Where? I just re-read it and didn't see this conclusion. (And even if they did - it's just cancer. What if we include heart diseases, too?)
    - Dylan16807 8y ago
      Ignoring the harm of the alternatives is also irrational. If you remove the wine you replace the calories with something else, and that will have its own risk numbers. Some studies sort of average that in but an average isn't nearly as good as numbers for specific items. You can't reasonably extrapolate total risk from one or two diseases either. Dealing with tiny risk factors is very difficult, and it's easy to make the wrong conclusions. See also the vast majority of reporting on whether x food is good or bad for you.
randomacct3847 8y ago
New findings show there’s no such thing as a “safe amount of alcohol” https://www.npr.org/2018/08/24/641618937/no-amount-of-alcohol-is-good-for-your-health-global-study-claims https://www.npr.org/2018/08/24/641618937/no-amount-of-alcoho...
- superpermutat0r 8y ago
  Well, the increased risks from 1 glass of wine per day is abysmal. Even 2 glasses of wine.
  - scottlocklin 8y ago
    That link (which keeps being posted in HN) a case study in terrible, absurd statistics. There's some other study recently touted that booze (and coffee) keeps old people alive longer. I have no idea if it's any more sound, but it's obvious that alcohol isn't that bad in moderation based on simple demographics.
  - scott_s 8y ago
    Yes, but that's not important takeaway. What's important is that with better, recent methodology, we're discovering that the "moderate drinking is beneficial" effect vanishes.
- AnIdiotOnTheNet 8y ago
  Eh, so what. To a certain extent everything enjoyable about life is harmful to your health. Ice cream, pizza, cigars, staring at screens while sitting for hours at a time, playing sports..
- diminoten 8y ago
  One study, one time. Also, studies find driving a car to be dangerous. Same with leaving your house.
DanBC 8y ago
You're right when you say that the quantity is important. The UK talks about "units" of alcohol. One unit is 10ml of pure alcohol. Drinks in the UK are labled with their Alcohol by Volume (ABV) percentage. To work out how many units are in a drink you multiply the serving size in litres by the ABV number. Current UK guidelines are no alcohol at all if you're pregnant, and less than 14 units a week with some days alcohol free and don't save up the units for a binge. In the past wine used to be weaker and serving sizes were smaller. One unit of wine is one glass at 125ml at 8%. In the UK by law everywhere selling glass by the wine has to offer a 125ml serving. That doesn't have to be a prominent offer though, it could be a footnote to the menu. UK serving sizes tend to be 175ml (for a small) or 250ml (for a large). This means there's huge variation in the quantity that people drink when they describe "5 glasses a week". Five glasses * 125ml * 8%ABV is 5 units. Five glasses * 175ml * 12.5%ABV is 11 units. Five glasses * 250ml *12.5%ABV is 15.5 units. 15 units a week isn't hugely worrying, but it's a big difference. I guess we'd want people drinking 15 units a week to unwind after work to take up some exercise or mindfulness instead. There's some cultural variation too. When a middle class couple in the UK talk about "a glass of wine" that could mean "half a bottle", and "a few times a week" could mean "most days". I used to work in a factory and people spoke about "going for a beer" after work, and that never meant one beer, it meant a drinking session where two or three beers are drunk.
- koolba 8y ago
  > Five glasses x 250ml x 12.5%ABV is 15.5 units. I’ve always found it easier to visualize drink quantities relative to a standard bottle, 750ml for most wine and spirits. So that 250ml serving is 1/3 of a bottle per glass.
  - samstave 8y ago
    Yep - its pretty commonly accepted that a bottle of wine is ~3 glasses.
    - ancientworldnow 8y ago
      No it's not? A typical bottle should be about 5 glasses + or - one depending on how you pour.
joekrill 8y ago
I guess it depends what you define as "not ok". I mean, why is smoking 4-5 times a week not ok? Why is shooting up heroin 4-5 times a week not ok? In the end, we're simply willfully poisoning ourselves. For some reason we, as a society, have decided that it's OK to poison ourselves with certain substances (caffeine, cigarette smoke) but not others (heroin, methamphetamines). We've made this socially acceptable. So if by "ok" you mean socially acceptable, thensure, it's ok.
- foldr 8y ago
  > caffeine There's little evidence that drinking coffee or tea is bad for you overall. In contrast, anything beyond very moderate alcohol consumption is almost certainly bad for you.
  - virgilp 8y ago
    Ingesting too large amounts of caffeine is almost certainly bad for you. It's a stimulant that increases your blood pressure and heart rate. You don't want to overdo that. It's also diuretic, if you substitute water for coffee (which some people do) it can actually lead to dehydration. But yes, I agree to your larger point that coffee is less dangerous than alcohol.
    - foldr 8y ago
      >It's a stimulant that increases your blood pressure and heart rate. Does it do that to a significant extent to regular users, though? I thought the stimulant effects mostly went away once you build up a tolerance. Similarly, there is little diuretic effect for regular coffee drinkers: http://www.bbc.com/future/story/20140402-are-coffee-and-tea-dehydrating http://www.bbc.com/future/story/20140402-are-coffee-and-tea-...
      - virgilp 8y ago
        Interesting, I didn't know that. As to stimulation effect for regular users... I guess it might depend, but for me, I do notice when I drink too much coffee. And I am a "regular user" - I'd say I drink around 4 espresso a day (which is not a problem, but if say I bump that up to 10, I definitely feel it)

tonyedgecombe 8y ago

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2003/oct/27/worlddispatch.france https://www.theguardian.com/world/2003/oct/27/worlddispatch.... "The findings reveal that the widespread perception of the French as a healthy nation is rapidly becoming outdated."

dnate 8y ago
> "We're not proponents of complete abstinence. There probably is an amount of drinking that's OK," LoConte told NPR in June. "But from a cancer-prevention standpoint, drinking the least amount of alcohol possible would be the best strategy." I always found defending your drinking with the "a glass of wine a day is good for your heart" study a bit lame. But advocating abstinence because no level of alcohol is safe is very narrow minded as well.
- Retric 8y ago
  Saying something is ok in moderation always defines moderation relative to the harm. This study puts moderation very low ~1-2 glasses of wine a month. Studies focused on different forms of harm have different thresholds, but you get all forms of harm not just what a specific study looks at. Saying I accept the harm for this benefit is fine, but pretending it does not exist is irrational.
  - virgilp 8y ago
    Do you have the study? Not some newspaper articles. It feels very unlikely to me that they were able to prove harm from 3 glasses a month, I'd like to read that. [edit] In the article cited in NPR, https://www.thelancet.com/action/showPdf?pii=S0140-6736%2818%2931310-2 https://www.thelancet.com/action/showPdf?pii=S0140-6736%2818... , which makes the claim "zero consumption minimises risk", you can see that ischemic heart disease & diabetes risks actually go down for 1 glass a day, while cancer & tuberculosis go slightly up. Their own chart of "relative weighted risk from all attributable causes" is flat-line for the first 1 glass/day. And that's from the paper that's cited to say "no level of alcohol consumption is safe!"
    - Retric 8y ago
      We are looking at different studies. This is the meta analysis I am referring to: “Every category of drinking was associated with an increased risk of cancer.” https://www.researchgate.net/publication/268874745_Alcohol_consumption_and_site-specific_cancer_risk_A_comprehensive_dose-response_meta-analysis https://www.researchgate.net/publication/268874745_Alcohol_c... PS: The study included what it called light drinking as a cancer risk. I am less generous with terminology.
      - virgilp 8y ago
        Look at the "light drinking"[] result in figure 2 - most whiskers cross the 1.0 line when it's not downright in the left-hand side! (e.g. lung cancer relative risk - if you trust that result, it means light drinking _improves_ your lung cancer prospects). They flat out state that lymphoma risk is inversely correlated with drinking. AND it's only about cancer - no word about other diseases (e.g. ischemic heart disease, where there are studies showing light wine drinking improve your odds). Overall, your meta-study hardly proves that "any quantity of alcohol is bad for your health"; quite the contrary in fact, I'd say. [] 1 glass of wine a day according to their definition.
        Retric 8y ago
        You are ignoring what the paper actually says. Each cancer type is independently analyzed independently. 1 wine a day measurably increases overal cancer risks as stated by the authors. Rather than assuming you have a better understanding after a quick analysis you may want to rethink your analysis. Hint the base rate for each cancer is not equivalent.
        virgilp 8y ago
        > 1 wine a day measurably increases overal cancer risks as stated by the authors. Where? I just re-read it and didn't see this conclusion. (And even if they did - it's just cancer. What if we include heart diseases, too?)
  - Dylan16807 8y ago
    Ignoring the harm of the alternatives is also irrational. If you remove the wine you replace the calories with something else, and that will have its own risk numbers. Some studies sort of average that in but an average isn't nearly as good as numbers for specific items. You can't reasonably extrapolate total risk from one or two diseases either. Dealing with tiny risk factors is very difficult, and it's easy to make the wrong conclusions. See also the vast majority of reporting on whether x food is good or bad for you.

randomacct3847 8y ago

New findings show there’s no such thing as a “safe amount of alcohol” https://www.npr.org/2018/08/24/641618937/no-amount-of-alcohol-is-good-for-your-health-global-study-claims https://www.npr.org/2018/08/24/641618937/no-amount-of-alcoho...

superpermutat0r 8y ago
Well, the increased risks from 1 glass of wine per day is abysmal. Even 2 glasses of wine.
- scottlocklin 8y ago
  That link (which keeps being posted in HN) a case study in terrible, absurd statistics. There's some other study recently touted that booze (and coffee) keeps old people alive longer. I have no idea if it's any more sound, but it's obvious that alcohol isn't that bad in moderation based on simple demographics.
- scott_s 8y ago
  Yes, but that's not important takeaway. What's important is that with better, recent methodology, we're discovering that the "moderate drinking is beneficial" effect vanishes.
AnIdiotOnTheNet 8y ago
Eh, so what. To a certain extent everything enjoyable about life is harmful to your health. Ice cream, pizza, cigars, staring at screens while sitting for hours at a time, playing sports..
diminoten 8y ago
One study, one time. Also, studies find driving a car to be dangerous. Same with leaving your house.

DanBC 8y ago

You're right when you say that the quantity is important. The UK talks about "units" of alcohol. One unit is 10ml of pure alcohol. Drinks in the UK are labled with their Alcohol by Volume (ABV) percentage. To work out how many units are in a drink you multiply the serving size in litres by the ABV number. Current UK guidelines are no alcohol at all if you're pregnant, and less than 14 units a week with some days alcohol free and don't save up the units for a binge. In the past wine used to be weaker and serving sizes were smaller. One unit of wine is one glass at 125ml at 8%. In the UK by law everywhere selling glass by the wine has to offer a 125ml serving. That doesn't have to be a prominent offer though, it could be a footnote to the menu. UK serving sizes tend to be 175ml (for a small) or 250ml (for a large). This means there's huge variation in the quantity that people drink when they describe "5 glasses a week". Five glasses * 125ml * 8%ABV is 5 units. Five glasses * 175ml * 12.5%ABV is 11 units. Five glasses * 250ml *12.5%ABV is 15.5 units. 15 units a week isn't hugely worrying, but it's a big difference. I guess we'd want people drinking 15 units a week to unwind after work to take up some exercise or mindfulness instead. There's some cultural variation too. When a middle class couple in the UK talk about "a glass of wine" that could mean "half a bottle", and "a few times a week" could mean "most days". I used to work in a factory and people spoke about "going for a beer" after work, and that never meant one beer, it meant a drinking session where two or three beers are drunk.

koolba 8y ago
> Five glasses x 250ml x 12.5%ABV is 15.5 units. I’ve always found it easier to visualize drink quantities relative to a standard bottle, 750ml for most wine and spirits. So that 250ml serving is 1/3 of a bottle per glass.
- samstave 8y ago
  Yep - its pretty commonly accepted that a bottle of wine is ~3 glasses.
  - ancientworldnow 8y ago
    No it's not? A typical bottle should be about 5 glasses + or - one depending on how you pour.

joekrill 8y ago

I guess it depends what you define as "not ok". I mean, why is smoking 4-5 times a week not ok? Why is shooting up heroin 4-5 times a week not ok? In the end, we're simply willfully poisoning ourselves. For some reason we, as a society, have decided that it's OK to poison ourselves with certain substances (caffeine, cigarette smoke) but not others (heroin, methamphetamines). We've made this socially acceptable. So if by "ok" you mean socially acceptable, thensure, it's ok.

foldr 8y ago
> caffeine There's little evidence that drinking coffee or tea is bad for you overall. In contrast, anything beyond very moderate alcohol consumption is almost certainly bad for you.
- virgilp 8y ago
  Ingesting too large amounts of caffeine is almost certainly bad for you. It's a stimulant that increases your blood pressure and heart rate. You don't want to overdo that. It's also diuretic, if you substitute water for coffee (which some people do) it can actually lead to dehydration. But yes, I agree to your larger point that coffee is less dangerous than alcohol.
  - foldr 8y ago
    >It's a stimulant that increases your blood pressure and heart rate. Does it do that to a significant extent to regular users, though? I thought the stimulant effects mostly went away once you build up a tolerance. Similarly, there is little diuretic effect for regular coffee drinkers: http://www.bbc.com/future/story/20140402-are-coffee-and-tea-dehydrating http://www.bbc.com/future/story/20140402-are-coffee-and-tea-...
    - virgilp 8y ago
      Interesting, I didn't know that. As to stimulation effect for regular users... I guess it might depend, but for me, I do notice when I drink too much coffee. And I am a "regular user" - I'd say I drink around 4 espresso a day (which is not a problem, but if say I bump that up to 10, I definitely feel it)