Alcohol may also drinking out of boredom speed HIV progression in people living with the disease, influence their engagement and retention in HIV treatment, and increase their susceptibility to organ damage and coinfections. Alcohol misuse can also lead to high blood pressure, an irregular heartbeat (arrhythmia), or increased heart rate. There is also evidence that alcohol can disrupt or delay puberty. For example, alcohol misuse is linked to peripheral neuropathy, a condition that commonly occurs in people with severe alcohol use disorder (AUD) and can cause numbness in the arms and legs and painful burning in the feet.
- We talked with hepatologist Shreya Sengupta, MD, about how alcohol use affects your body and your emotional health.
- Knowing what counts as one standard drink can help you figure out how much alcohol you drink and whether it would be considered excessive.
- To date, federal agencies like the National Institutes of Health have shown no interest in exclusively funding these studies on alcohol.
- Now the pendulum has swung so far in the opposite direction that contemporary narratives suggest every ounce of alcohol is dangerous.
- Excessive alcohol use can harm people who drink and those around them.
- In addition to its effects on the brain, alcohol also affects the peripheral nervous system, which comprises the nerves outside the brain and spinal cord.
In observational trials, it also appears to lower the risk of diabetes. When the data from both types of studies point in the same direction, we can have more confidence in the conclusion. One major challenge in this field is the lack of large, long-term, high-quality studies. But the increase was driven nearly entirely by breast cancer. Newer studies are not necessarily better than older research. Earlier this month, for instance, the media reported on a new study that found even small amounts of alcohol might be harmful.
Excessive alcohol use
If you already drink at low levels and continue to drink, risks for these issues appear to be low. For example, it may be used to define the risk of illness or injury based on the number of drinks a person has in a week. Moderate alcohol use may not mean the same thing in research studies or among health agencies. Many people drink alcohol as a personal preference, during social activities, or as a part of cultural and religious practices. While the risk is low for moderate intake, the risk goes up as the amount you drink goes up. Drinking alcohol is a health risk regardless of the amount.
Understanding excessive drinking
Heavy drinking also has been linked to intentional injuries, such as suicide, as well as accidental injury and death. That usually means four or more drinks within two hours for women and five or more drinks within two hours for men. It means on days when a person does drink, women do not have more than one drink and men do not have more than two drinks. Here’s a closer look at alcohol and health. For more information about alcohol and cancer, please visit the National Cancer Institute’s webpage “Alcohol and Cancer Risk” (last accessed June 6, 2024). Chronic pancreatitis is a risk factor for the development of pancreatic cancer and diabetes.
Heart and Circulatory System
Damaged DNA can cause a cell to grow out of control, which results in cancerous tumors. But prolonged alcohol abuse can lead to chronic (long-term) pancreatitis, which can be severe. But wait, you may be thinking, what about those headlines that claim red wine is supposed to be good for my heart? Warnings from the World Heart Federation go so far as to state that no amount of alcohol is safe for your ticker. They also help fend off inflammation and support healthy metabolism.
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Some of these strategies — such as watching for peer pressure, keeping busy, asking for support, being aware of temptation, and being persistent — can also be helpful for people who want to give up alcohol completely. Maybe you feel that you’re drinking too much or too often. You can take steps to lower your risk of alcohol-related harms. Excessive drinking can also be deadly. About 178,000 people die from excessive alcohol use each year in the United States.1 Alcohol abuse and the addiction of alcoholism are common maladies in developed countries worldwide.
We need more high-quality evidence to assess the health impacts of moderate alcohol consumption. 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 when you consider how alcohol is metabolized and used by your body, we can start to see that even moderate and social drinking affects our health to some degree.” But heavy drinking carries a much higher risk even for those without other health concerns.
Is alcohol good or bad for you? Yes.
Yet we continue to see reductive narratives, in the media and even in science journals, that alcohol in any amount is dangerous. It’s hard to escape the message these days that every sip of wine, every swig of beer is bad for your health. This story was previously published in Harvard Public Health magazine, which featured independent journalism about public health challenges and solutions outside Harvard Chan School.
The NIH found that officials at one of its institutes had solicited funding from alcohol manufacturers, violating federal policy. Alcohol manufacturers have previously expressed some willingness to finance the studies—similar to the way pharmaceutical companies finance most drug testing—but that has often led to criticism. Large, long-term, gold-standard studies are expensive. Again, that evidence is persuasive in combination.
When to avoid alcohol
In the 1980s and 1990s, for instance, alcohol in moderation, and especially red wine, was touted as healthful. To date, federal agencies like the National Institutes of Health have shown no interest in exclusively funding these studies on alcohol. Medicine and public health would benefit greatly if better data were available to offer more conclusive guidance about alcohol. Instead, much alcohol research is observational, meaning it follows large groups of drinkers and abstainers over time. Information and shareable resources to help others choose to drink less alcohol and be their best. The cost of excessive alcohol use impacts everyone, whether they drink or not.
Other chronic diseases
If you drink every day, or almost every day, you might notice that you catch colds, flu or other illnesses more frequently than people who don’t drink. Alcohol use has been shown to raise your risk for several kinds of cancer. Your body breaks alcohol down into a chemical called acetaldehyde, which damages your DNA. “And that goes for your heart, as well as the rest of your body.”
Current research points to health risks even at low amounts of alcohol consumption, regardless of beverage type. The term “drinking” is often used metonymically for the consumption of alcoholic beverages. Evidence-based hydration experts say that the amount of drinking water needed depends on ambient temperature, activity level, body size, and sweat rate. Lack of hydration causes thirst, a desire to drink which is regulated by the hypothalamus in response to subtle changes in the body’s electrolyte levels and blood volume. It’s tempting to assume that because heavy alcohol consumption is very bad, lesser amounts must be at least a little bad. As these examples illustrate, drinking alcohol may raise the risk of some conditions but not others.
- Alcohol may also speed HIV progression in people living with the disease, influence their engagement and retention in HIV treatment, and increase their susceptibility to organ damage and coinfections.
- We have been researching the health effects of alcohol for a combined 60 years.
- Yes, grabbing a few beers or a couple of glasses of wine or cocktails with friends can increase your heart rate — dangerously in some cases
- About 178,000 people die from excessive alcohol use each year in the United States.1
But even moderate alcohol use changes the way your body functions. Alcohol affects your whole body, from your liver and immune system to your brain and mental health Drinking moderately if you’re otherwise healthy may be a risk you’re willing to take. When it comes to alcohol, if you don’t drink, don’t start for health reasons. In the United States, people younger than age 21 are not legally able to drink alcohol.
Public Health
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. And heavy drinking is unequivocally harmful to health. Steatotic liver disease develops in about 90% of people who drink more than 1.5 to 2 ounces of alcohol per day. Binge drinking is behavior that raises blood alcohol levels to 0.08%. For men, heavy drinking means more than four drinks on any day or more than 14 drinks a week. For women, more than three drinks on any day or more than seven drinks a week is heavy drinking.
Each of those consequences can cause turmoil that can negatively affect your long-term emotional health. Long-term alcohol use can change your brain’s wiring in much more significant ways. The morning after a night of over-imbibing can cause some temporary effects on your brain. “That can leave them more vulnerable to infectious diseases.”
