Most people I know would consider two drinks a week sobriety, not moderation...
This trial provided access to the detailed information of almost 100,000 participants throughout the United States who were followed for an average of 8.9 years. Their results are published this week in the journal PLOS Medicine.
Across the study, there were 9,559 deaths and 12,763 primary cancers. All individuals took a diet history questionnaire that included information about their drinking habits. Each participant was assigned a group based on alcohol consumption. These included:
- lifetime never drinkers (LN) — no alcohol consumption
- infrequent drinkers (ID) — one or fewer drinks per week
- light drinkers (LD) — one to three drinks per week
- heavy drinkers (HD) — two to three drinks per day
- very heavy drinkers (VHD) — three or more drinks per day
Again, the team found evidence of a J-shaped interaction between health outcomes and alcohol. Of the groups outlined above, LD had the lowest mortality risk.
This means that those who drank one to three drinks per week had less risk than both those who drank less alcohol each week and those who drank more.
When the scientists investigated lifetime cancer risk, they found a linear relationship between the amount of alcohol consumed and risk; each drink per day increased the risk of cancer.
However, when cancer risk and mortality were analyzed together, LD still had the lowest risk of all groups.