Alcohol cardio-protection has been talked up.
Doctors have been promoting alcohol as a health tonic for a very long time. The last 30 years has seen the accumulation of a considerable medical literature investigating the potential role of alcohol use as a protection against coronary heart disease. When viewed through the lens of two major early reviews in the mid-1980s, Sir Richard Doll's contributions of the mid-1990s, two large meta-analyses of 10 years ago and two most recent overviews, the health-giving properties of alcohol use become increasingly debatable. The influence of the alcohol industry is raised as a factor in the exaggeration of alcohol use as a health intervention, in similar fashion to activities of pharmaceutical companies. The status of alcohol as a potentially dangerous recreational drug is emphasised as a warning against talking up alcohol as a cardio-protection manoeuvre by anyone.
Department of Psychological Medicine, University of Otago, Christchurch, PO Box 4345, Christchurch 8140, New Zealand.
Doug
D
Sellman
Jennie
J
Connor
Geoffrey
G
Robinson
Rod
R
Jackson
D000428:Alcohol Drinking; D000434:Alcoholic Beverages / Q000706:statistics & numerical data*; D003327:Coronary Disease / Q000453:epidemiology / Q000517:prevention & control*; D006801:Humans; D009520:New Zealand / Q000453:epidemiology; D015995:Prevalence; D012307:Risk Factors