SoylentNews is people
SoylentNews
The American Society of Clinical Oncology (ASCO) has released a statement (open, DOI: 10.1200/JCO.2017.76.1155) (DX) discussing the links between alcohol consumption and cancer:
The statement provides evidence of a connection between light drinking and an increased risk of esophageal and breast cancer. Heavy drinkers face a much longer list of risks, including mouth cancer, throat cancer, cancer of the voice box, liver cancer, and colorectal cancer. That's a whole lot of cancers.
"The message is not, 'Don't drink.' It's, 'If you want to reduce your cancer risk, drink less," said Dr. Noelle LoConte, lead author of the statement. "And if you don't drink, don't start." She says this "subtle" take on the issue is somewhat less cautionary than the warnings about smoking. But the message rings the same.
The doctors behind the statement aimed to draw attention to what they view as a public health problem and advocate for a push towards better education and research.
Also at Medscape and ASCO (shorter press release).
Previously: Study Shows 3 Drinks a Day May Cause Liver Cancer
Related: Even Moderate Drinking Linked to a Decline in Brain Health
Researchers Make Alcohol Out of Thin Air
No Magic Pill to Cure Alcohol Dependence Yet
Early Age of Drinking Leads to Neurocognitive and Neuropsychological Damage
(Score: 2) by frojack on Friday November 10 2017, @01:11AM (5 children)
This flies in the face of hundreds of studies suggesting light to moderate alcohol consumption is actually health and extends life.
There seems to be a requirement to end your study, regardless of your results, with an admonishment to never take a drink.
Mostly because there exist people who may drink to excess.
No, you are mistaken. I've always had this sig.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday November 10 2017, @01:15AM
Define "excess".
Wait, gotta go stock up again.
(Score: 1) by pTamok on Friday November 10 2017, @08:25AM (2 children)
This flies in the face of hundreds of studies suggesting light to moderate alcohol consumption is actually health and extends life.
It would seem to, yes.
But...
If you understand the context here, you'll find out it is entirely compatible with that (unfortunately, probably incorrect - I'll come back to this) research.
The first thing to notice is that this is a statement from the The American Society of Clinical Oncology - they are talking specifically about cancer risk.
The research you refer to is epidemiological research which looks at all-cause mortality - not just cancer.
In fact it is well known that alcohol is protective against cardiovascular events (like 'heart attack' and 'stroke'). So while alcohol increases your upper-digestive tract cancer risk (e.g. oesophageal cancer)((This is also already well known)), it protects against other causes of death. The epidemiological research shows that these effects balance out (pretty much), and most such research seems to indicate a 'J-curve' effect where drinking small-to-moderate amounts is overall protective - that is all-cause mortality figures for teetotallers is worse than for small-to-moderate drinkers.
However...
Epidemiological research in this area is hard to get right. You need to take into account all sorts of things that can skew your data - for example, some people are teetotal because they can't drink because they are too ill: and sometimes they are ill because of an alcohol induced disease like cirrhosis of the liver. It turns out that if you do the necessary corrections for this kind of thing, the 'J-curve' effect vanishes, and you get a normal dose-repose relationship: the more alcohol you regularly drink, the higher the all-cause mortality rate.
So the lesson from this is: don't cherry-pick your data - concentrating on cancer risk while ignoring cardiovascular effects is not helpful: but also, make sure you have corrected for sources of skew in your data (this is hard).
The paper showing the disappearance of the 'J-curve' is "Do “Moderate” Drinkers Have Reduced Mortality Risk? A Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis of Alcohol Consumption and All-Cause Mortality - Journal of Studies on Alcohol and Drugs, 77(2), 185–198 (2016). [jsad.com]. It is good research. It will take a while to filter through into general consciousness.
There's a commentary on the paper here: Moderate drinkers may not have reduced risk of all-cause mortality: a lifecourse perspective [bmj.com]
And here is press release, which is quite readable, about the study: Public Release: 22-Mar-2016 Is moderate drinking really good for you? Journal of Studies on Alcohol and Drugs [eurekalert.org]
Full disclosure: I drink low-to-moderate amounts of alcohol, even knowing it is likely decreasing my life expectancy. I like drinking, and it is a bit irritating that I can no longer claim that drinking small amounts is good for me. Them's the breaks. Sláinte!
(Score: 2) by frojack on Friday November 10 2017, @09:21AM (1 child)
Sometimes?
So the 6 people who gave up drinking because cirrhosis has them circling the drain, somehow hid a life of alcoholism, and got classified as a tee totaler, and totally overwhelmed the statistics of entire religions that never partake of alcohol from cradle to grave?
Meta analysis!!!
No, you are mistaken. I've always had this sig.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday November 10 2017, @03:40PM
People in religions that never partake of alcohol also do other things not related to alcohol that tend to cause good health. Pinning it on alcohol is something that alcoholics love because it helps rationalize what they're doing.
The 7th day adventists get used in studies like that all the time, but it's not just the lack of alcohol, they do numerous other things that are good for their bodies and get health that matches the work they put into it. Likewise, Mormons are hardly just cutting the alcohol out, they cut caffeine out and have a
Here's a summary link of some religious dietary restrictions. Most of them bar alcohol and have other components that are firmly established to improve health. There's a couple that don't, but they aren't cited as having extraordinary health either.
https://www.deseretnews.com/top/714/5/Mormonism-Dietary-guidelines-of-some-of-the-worlds-major-religions.html [deseretnews.com]
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday November 10 2017, @03:33PM
Simply put, those studies are full of shit.
People who drink in moderation are far more likely to be healthy than people who either binge or abstain completely for the simple reason that people who abstain are frequently recovered alcoholics and those that binge are likely to wind up with health problems associated with drug abuse.
This whole business about alcohol being health needs to stop. Alcohol is a poison that people largely tolerate in reasonable quantities. It is not now, nor has it ever been healthy. The main reason why so many people drink is because before we had the ability to treat and purify water, the alcohol in beers would kill most of the bacteria that were causing people to get sick. And even in that scenario, it's not that the alcohol was healthy, it was that it was less unhealthy than the alternative.