Health: pleasure and poison at the same time

It is hard to believe that both cases are supposed to be the same substance: there is this tasty red that refines the evening with friends and makes it end in high spirits after bold conversations – and at the same time the veins stay elastic and the heart fresh. And then there is a similar drop from the same region that is used as an anesthetic and causes liver damage, cancer and cognitive decline. Yes, what now – culturally ennobled elixir of life or path to infirmity and perdition? Hardly any other luxury food has such a contradictory reputation as alcohol, although strict critics would reject the label “pleasure” and prefer to speak of cell and nerve toxins.

Scientists from the World Health Organization have just drawn attention to the harm to health caused by alcohol. In the trade magazine Lancet Oncology Cancer experts at the International Agency for Research on Cancer (IARC) show that more than 740,000 new cancer cases in 2020 were due to alcohol. Most tumors were caused by heavy alcohol consumption and risky drinking behavior such as “binge drinking”. What was surprising for the researchers, however, was that one in seven of these cancer diagnoses (and thus more than 100,000 cases) was due to alcohol in low to moderate doses, which means one to a maximum of two drinks a day.

More than three quarters of alcohol-related cancer cases affect men

“Drinking is always associated with risk,” says Jürgen Rehm from the University of Toronto, who was involved in the study. “As far as cancer from alcohol is concerned, every level of consumption is associated with a certain risk. The probability of breast cancer increases by six percent with just one glass of wine a day.” The researchers calculated how often which alcohol consumption leads to cancer after ten years and linked these findings with drinking behavior in the respective countries.

More than three quarters of all alcohol-related cancer cases affect men. The risk from alcohol does not increase equally for all tumors, but especially for cancer of the oral cavity, esophagus, throat, larynx, but also for liver, rectum and breast cancer. Alcohol – or rather ethanol and the carcinogenic breakdown product acetaldehyde – affects the body in many ways. Either DNA, proteins and lipids are damaged directly, so that cells can degenerate. Oxidative stress caused by alcohol and altered hormone levels also promote cancer development. Ethanol also acts as a solvent for toxic substances, such as the chemicals in tobacco, and can thus increase the risk of cancer. “Alcohol is a major contributor to cancer,” says IARC’s Isabelle Soerjomataram. “But that is often neglected. If we want to reduce the burden of alcohol-related tumors, we have to raise awareness of this connection.”

Up to 45 percent of the population in East Asia can break down alcohol poorly due to a mutation because the relevant enzyme is less active in them. Those who are affected also have a higher risk of tumors in the mouth, throat and esophagus. Perhaps this is one of the reasons why it would benefit most people there to avoid alcohol. The IARC analysis shows that nine percent of cancer cases among men in East Asia could be avoided if no one had access to beer, wine, schnapps and the like. In Eastern Europe this rate is eight percent.

Some studies give the impression that wine must be prescribed on prescription

While thousands of studies have shown that alcohol is harmful to the body, there are a similar number of studies that suggest that alcohol has to be prescribed on prescription. Accordingly, the prospect of soft arteries, a strong heart, fewer heart attacks and strokes beckons if alcohol is consumed moderately but regularly. A recently published study in the Mayo Clinic Proceedings called, in which a higher life expectancy is prophesied for those who use alcohol in a moderate form. It was shown in more than 310,000 test persons that alcohol is only unhealthy if large quantities are drunk – or not at all.

This shows the dilemma of many studies on nutrition and consumer behavior: all facets of life can hardly be considered comprehensively. Alcohol is a cell poison – but if you exercise regularly, eat a varied diet, are satisfied with your job, friends and family, you can endure and compensate for impacts better. Cellular repair processes then run more efficiently, regeneration takes place faster, the organism is more defensive. Then there is relaxation and joie de vivre – and then alcohol is more a pleasure than a poison.

Corresponding praise arias for beer and wine should nevertheless be classified soberly. Years ago, studies showed that women who drink moderately regularly get pregnant faster than abstainers. This is not due to a fertility drug in alcohol, which has yet to be researched, but to its role as an emotional lubricant between the sexes. Women who go out for a drink now and then are more likely to find the company of men – and when both are no longer sober, one thing leads to another.