To Your Health: Top 10 Reasons to Celebrate National Drink Wine Day

National Drink Wine Day was created to celebrate healthy drinking so I thought it would be a good time to list 10 reasons why wine is good for health and longevity. Each of these is well established by peer-reviewed studies, and I have included a reference for those wanting more detail. In no particular order, here are a few of my favorites:

1. Wine drinkers are smart. A study from Denmark found a strong correlation of IQ to preference for wine. http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/16185206

2. Wine drinkers live longer. Daily moderate consumption of wine is associated with longer average lifespan as compared to nondrinkers and beer or spirits drinkers. http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/11576317

3. Wine helps prevent diabetes and is good for diabetics. http://diabetes.diabetesjournals.org/content/63/1/31.long

4. Wine drinkers are less likely to get Alzheimer’s disease. Many studies show a strong correlation of moderate red wine consumption and better cognitive function with age. http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4030174/

5. Wine drinkers have a higher quality of life, particularly in old age. http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/26797806

6. Wine is good for bone health and is associated with lower odds of osteoporosis. http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/25832032

7. Although the role of wine and cancer is controversial, especially for breast cancer, overall cancer deaths are lower in wine drinkers. As with other things it is a J-shaped curve. http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/15134372

8. Smile! Wine is good for dental health and helps prevent cavities. http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/17547418

9. Red wine drinkers have fewer colds and flu. The same is true to a lesser extent for white wine. http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/11978590

10. Oh and the “French Paradox” heart health thing. This one is so well documented that I am not including a reference, but the next time you hear a report saying something like “…some studies suggest that wine lowers the risk of heart attack” I would suggest that you send this list to the reporter.

This is of course a very incomplete list and all of these things are based on the model of daily moderate consumption. So every day should be drink wine day!

New site! https://agebetterwithwine.wordpress.com/

Thank you for your interest in wine and health! For updates please visit my new page https://agebetterwithwine.wordpress.com/

Revisiting resveratrol: new findings rekindle anti-aging debate

Just when we thought the bloom was off the rosé for resveratrol, the anti-oxidant polyphenol from red wine with multiple anti-aging properties, along comes new research giving life to the debate. But first a bit of background: As I detailed in my book Age Gets Better with Wine , it is well-documented that wine drinkers live longer and have lower rates of many diseases of aging. Much or the credit for this has been given to resveratrol, though there isn’t nearly enough of it in wine to explain the effects. Nevertheless, I dubbed it the “miracle molecule” and when it was reported to activate a unique life-extension phenomenon via a genetic trigger called SIRT, an industry was born, led by Sirtris Pharmaceuticals, quickly acquired by pharma giant Glaxo. The hope was that resveratrol science could lead to compounds enabling people to live up to 150 years and with a good quality of life. But alas, researchers from other labs could not duplicate the results, and clinical studies disa

Which came first: Beer or wine? (or something else?)

Actually neither beer nor wine was the first fermented beverage, and wine arguably has a closer connection to health, but recent evidence indicates that humans developed the ability to metabolize alcohol long before we were even human. The uniquely human ability to handle alcohol comes from the digestive enzyme alcohol dehydrogenase, or ADH4. A new science called paleogenetics identifies the emergence of the modern version of the ADH4 gene in our ape ancestors some 10 million years ago. Interestingly, this corresponds to the time when our arboreal forebears transitioned to a nomadic lifestyle on the ground. We went from swinging from tree limbs to walking upright, and the rest is history. Understanding the circumstances that led to perpetuation of the ADH4 mutation may contain clues to what made us human in the first place. How the ability to metabolize alcohol made us human Paleogenetecist Matthew Carrigan has an idea about how this happened . Arboreal species rely on fruit tha

wine and health

Search This Blog