Re: Wine and mortality

[Guest guest]

Hi Francesca:

It was post # 16715:

" Hi :

In my opinion absolutely a MUST READ: " Mortality Associated with

Moderate Intakes of Wine, Beer, or Spirits " . BMJ 1995;310:1165-9

Prospective study, 6051 men, 7234 women, end point was mortality, ten

to twelve years of follow up.

In short: escalating spirit (liquor) consumption, beyond two drinks

a day, resulted in rapidly escalating mortality. Escalating beer

consumption had no net effect on mortality in either direction up to

five beers a day. Escalating wine consumption was associated with a

strong dose-dependent REDUCTION in mortality. Mortality was reduced

by 49% in those drinking three to five glasses of wine daily compared

with those who never drank wine.

THIS STRONGLY SUGGESTS IT IS NOT THE ALCOHOL THAT CONFERS THE

BENEFIT. Most likely the benefit derives from what wine makers refer

to as the 'products of fermentation' which are absent in liquor,

because it is distilled, and lower in beer because it has much lower

amount of alcohol/fermentation products.

I ought to drink more wine than I do.

If anyone knows of any other substance we can add to our diet for

which a prospective study of over 10,000 subjects, studied for more

than ten years, by an organization (in this case the Danish

Epidemiology Science Centre) that has no obvious axe to grind, has

shown a reduction in mortality as large as or greater than this,

PLEEEASE post it. Thank you.

[The study also took account of smoking; BMI; education; and income]

Rodney. "

Rodney.

> Amazing that the greatest benefit was achieved with only 1.5 ounces

of

> wine per day.

>

> " Participants who drank on average half a glass, or 1.5 ounces, of

> wine per day, over a long period, had a 40 percent lower rate of

> all-cause death and a 48 percent lower incidence of cardiovascular

> death, compared to the non-wine drinkers.

>

> ------ End of Forwarded Message

>

[Guest guest]

Hi folks:

Here is the abstract. I have a hard copy of it filed somewhere here.

" Mortality associated with moderate intakes of wine, beer, or spirits.

Gronbaek M, Deis A, Sorensen TI, Becker U, Schnohr P, Jensen G.

Danish Epidemiology Science Centre, Institute of Preventive Medicine,

Copenhagen Hospital Corporation.

OBJECTIVE--To examine the association between intake of different

types of alcoholic drinks and mortality. DESIGN--Prospective

population study with baseline assessment of alcohol intake, smoking

habit, income, education, and body mass index, and 10-12 years'

follow up of mortality. SETTING--Copenhagen city heart study,

Denmark. SUBJECTS--6051 men and 7234 women aged 30-70 years. MAIN

OUTCOME MEASURE--Number and time of cause-specific deaths from 1976

to 1988. RESULTS--The risk of dying steadily decreased with an

increasing intake of wine--from a relative risk of 1.00 for the

subjects who never drank wine to 0.51 (95% confidence interval 0.32

to 0.81) for those who drank three to five glasses a day. Intake of

neither beer nor spirits, however, was associated with reduced risk.

For spirits intake the relative risk of dying increased from 1.00 for

those who never drank to 1.34 (1.05 to 1.71) for those with an intake

of three to five drinks a day. The effects of the three types of

alcoholic drinks seemed to be independent of each other, and no

significant interactions existed with sex, age, education, income,

smoking, or body mass index. Wine drinking showed the same relation

to risk of death from cardiovascular and cerebrovascular disease as

to risk of death from all causes. CONCLUSION--Low to moderate intake

of wine is associated with lower mortality from cardiovascular and

cerebrovascular disease and other causes. Similar intake of spirits

implied an increased risk, while beer drinking did not affect

mortality. "

PMID: 7767150

Incidentally, in this study, of all the groups they studied, for

multiple different levels of intake for each of spirits, wine and

beer, the one with the lowest mortality of all was for those who

consumed more than five glasses of wine daily!

Difficult to believe and *certainly* not recommended.

They point out in the full text, however, that they didn't have a

large enough sample of subjects in this group to achieve statistical

significance. Nevertheless there was a pretty clear dose-response

curve and the data for the 'more than five glasses of wine category'

was not obviously aberrant in the context of the rest of the curve.

Rodney.

> > Amazing that the greatest benefit was achieved with only 1.5

ounces

> of

> > wine per day.

> >

> > " Participants who drank on average half a glass, or 1.5 ounces, of

> > wine per day, over a long period, had a 40 percent lower rate of

> > all-cause death and a 48 percent lower incidence of cardiovascular

> > death, compared to the non-wine drinkers.

> >

> > ------ End of Forwarded Message

> >

>