Half a unit of alcohol a day best for health
(Medical Xpress) — Cutting the amount we drink to just over half a unit a day could save 4,600 lives a year in England, according to a modelling study by Oxford University researchers published in the journal BMJ Open.
Half a unit of alcohol is as little as a quarter of a glass of wine, or a quarter of a pint. That’s much lower than current government recommendations of between 3 to 4 units a day for men and 2–3 units for women.
The researchers set out to find the optimum daily amount of alcohol that would see fewest deaths across England from a whole range of diseases connected to drink. Previous studies have often looked at the separate effects of alcohol on heart disease, liver disease or cancers in isolation.
“Although there is good evidence that moderate alcohol consumption protects against heart disease, when all of the chronic disease risks are balanced against each other, the optimal consumption level is much lower than many people believe,” says lead author Dr. Melanie Nichols of the BHF Health Promotion Research Group in the Department of Public Health at Oxford University.
The team used a mathematical model to assess what impact changing average alcohol consumption would have on deaths from 11 conditions known to be at least partially linked to drink.
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