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Low and moderate alcohol consumption not associated with increased mortality

jamanetwork.com

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Re: Low and moderate alcohol consumption not associated with increased mortality

#31

Post by epistasis »

brianwawok wrote: post #5

It's very weird how the conclusion of many of these studies are "Men with 1 drink a day, we see no difference. Women with 1 drink a day die sooner". What makes the effect so different?

That's a very good question that we likely can't answer right now. "Woman" and "man" encompass a very wide range of bodies, with different averages, but whose distribution overlaps immensely on nearly every metric.

These gender categories are standins for some subset of differences that are actually causal, but we don't have the measurements and experiments settings to pull out what is actually causal from this.

Re: Low and moderate alcohol consumption not associated with increased mortality

#32

Post by rcarr »

madsbuch wrote: post #23
loufe wrote: post #14

I find headlines like this unbelievable. Of course adding poison to your body is unhealthy and will affect mortality. The Canadian and WHO statements make intrinsic sense, it isn't quite smoking, but let's not fool ourselves about what we're doing. I'm still going to consume alcohol, but I'm not going to deceive myself about it negatively impacting my health, regardless of the conclusion of yet another meta-analysis…

> Of course adding poison to your body is unhealthy I have two recommendations for you: 1. Look up hormesis: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hormesis 2. Watch out taking statements like that for granted and embed the infamous last words of "Of course"

Came here to mention Mithridates but he’s covered by that Wikipedia page

Re: Low and moderate alcohol consumption not associated with increased mortality

#33

Post by feral_serf »

misiti3780 wrote: post #6

Why do this alcohol studies keep coming up? They are so polarizing to everyone.

We need to work through the polarization. As a Canadian who enjoys 1-2 drinks a day I'm more likely to ignore all health guidelines from my government now that they seem alarmist.

Re: Low and moderate alcohol consumption not associated with increased mortality

#34

Post by 0xcde4c3db »

kspacewalk2 wrote: post #4

Everyone on this topic seems to have their own studies to back polar opposite conclusions. Canada is going the opposite direction[0], taking the position that "no amount of alcohol is safe to consume". [0] https://www.ctvnews.ca/health/what-you-should-know-about-can...

I might be mixing up my jargon here, but I was under the impression that "no safe amount" and similar phrases refer to a standard of categorization that is scientifically meaningful but usually offers little practical guidance relative to common lifestyle patterns (e.g. by this standard there's also no safe amount of wood dust to inhale and no safe amount of cured meat to eat). My understanding is that the risks of alcohol consumption are highly nonlinear, so the upshot is that while the risk of something like 5 standard drinks per week is not zero, it's so small for the average person that the stress of actively worrying about it might very well be worse for their health than the alcohol itself.

Re: Low and moderate alcohol consumption not associated with increased mortality

#35

Post by LordDragonfang »

loufe wrote: post #14

I find headlines like this unbelievable. Of course adding poison to your body is unhealthy and will affect mortality. The Canadian and WHO statements make intrinsic sense, it isn't quite smoking, but let's not fool ourselves about what we're doing. I'm still going to consume alcohol, but I'm not going to deceive myself about it negatively impacting my health, regardless of the conclusion of yet another meta-analysis…

It's a poison, yes, but it's one that we specifically evolved an enzyme to allow us to consume safely (originally rotting fruit)

Re: Low and moderate alcohol consumption not associated with increased mortality

#36

Post by AndrewKemendo »

An author of this paper was directly paid by an alcohol distributor outside of this study.

From the Conflict of Interest Disclosures: Dr Stockwell reported receiving personal fees from Ontario Public Servants Employees Union (OPSEU) for expert witness testimony and personal fees from Alko outside the submitted work. Dr Sherk reported receiving grants from Canadian Centre on Substance Use and Addiction (CCSA) during the conduct of the study. No other disclosures were reported.

Alko Inc is the national alcoholic beverage retailing monopoly in Finland

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alko

Just because they claim the conflict doesn't mean it's not influencing the study.

In fact using the same philosophical criteria they use for this study attempting to eliminate "systematic biases that affect many studies" we should throw this one out, as having a commercial interest tied to anyone of the group should cause us to question the systemic bias within the study group.

edit: Thanks to CoolGuySteve for also pointing out that OPSEU is the union for Ontario's government run liquor store, LCBO

Re: Low and moderate alcohol consumption not associated with increased mortality

#37

Post by subtypefiddler »

loufe wrote: post #14

I find headlines like this unbelievable. Of course adding poison to your body is unhealthy and will affect mortality. The Canadian and WHO statements make intrinsic sense, it isn't quite smoking, but let's not fool ourselves about what we're doing. I'm still going to consume alcohol, but I'm not going to deceive myself about it negatively impacting my health, regardless of the conclusion of yet another meta-analysis…

> "Of course adding poison to your body is unhealthy and will affect mortality."

This is in contradiction with the basic principle of toxicology: "dosis sola facit venenum".

A "systematic review and meta-analysis of 107 cohort studies involving more than 4.8 million participants" cannot simply be shrugged away the way you do.

Re: Low and moderate alcohol consumption not associated with increased mortality

#38

Post by brianwawok »

chrisfosterelli wrote: post #16
brianwawok wrote: post #5

It's very weird how the conclusion of many of these studies are "Men with 1 drink a day, we see no difference. Women with 1 drink a day die sooner". What makes the effect so different?

Average body mass would be my guess.

So we could tease this out by taking 90-110kg men and comparing to 90-110kg women?

Re: Low and moderate alcohol consumption not associated with increased mortality

#39

Post by AstixAndBelix »

loufe wrote: post #14

I find headlines like this unbelievable. Of course adding poison to your body is unhealthy and will affect mortality. The Canadian and WHO statements make intrinsic sense, it isn't quite smoking, but let's not fool ourselves about what we're doing. I'm still going to consume alcohol, but I'm not going to deceive myself about it negatively impacting my health, regardless of the conclusion of yet another meta-analysis…

The human body can metabolize around 1AU (alcoholic unit) every 24h, which roughly corresponds to a can of light beer or a cup of light wine, without damage. This is why (very) moderate drinkers don't seem to have increased mortality

Re: Low and moderate alcohol consumption not associated with increased mortality

#40

Post by mil22 »

While they found low alcohol consumption did not reduce all-cause mortality relative to abstention, other studies have shown a shift with reduced cardiovascular mortality balanced out by increased cancer mortality.

For me the primary reason to stop drinking was preservation of brain cells. Recent studies have shown a simple dose response relationship between neuronal death and alcohol consumption, with no minimum threshold. Even one drink will kill a few. They don’t grow back.

Since quitting in 2021, I have become noticeably sharper, my code quality has improved, and I feel better. I do not miss it at all.

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