Good News From Wine and Heart Health Symposium

The news from the Sixth International Wine and Heart Health Symposium is even better than expected. After extensive analysis of research on the subject and their own patients, doctors at Kaiser Permanente have found that not only does moderate consumption of wine reduce the risk for deaths from coronary and vascular disease, but it also reduces the risk for ischemic strokes, diabetes and even gallstones.

An extensive recent and carefully conducted large-scale unpublished study in Nancy, France, further confirms the positive findings.   Other research demonstrates that low to moderate use of wine helps suppress E. coli bacteria, may reduce the incidence of colorectal and gastric cancer, and even improves cognitive function as you age; the traditional advice to drink less as you get older doesn't seem true after all. And though incidence of breast cancer seems to rise slightly with moderate drinking, since many more women die from heart disease (1 in 2) than breast cancer (1 in 25), the numbers still favor wine consumption. Women and older people actually benefit more proportionately from wine than even younger men.

And perhaps most comforting, moderate drinking may be more than the typically recommended 1 or 2 glasses per day. Benefits seem to increase with 3 to 5 glass of wine a day for an average man. Interestingly, the optimum Body Mass Index - a measure of appropriate weight - - turns out to be about 26, classed as slightly overweight by current government charts, yet moderate wine drinking may actually help reduce obesity.  Also, contrary to some earlier research and claims, beer, spirits and unfermented grape juice do not provide as much protection as wine.

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