just-drinks authors and correspondents

Columns by International Scientific Forum on Alcohol Research

Critiques from the International Scientific Forum on Alcohol Research

The International Scientific Forum on Alcohol Research hosts forums that look at research conducted around the world on the relationship between alcohol consumption and health.

Articles by International Scientific Forum on Alcohol Research

Why alcohol guidelines should remember that consumers are not the same the world over - International Scientific Forum on Alcohol Research Critique 246 8 February 2021

A recently-released study used alcohol-attributable data - based on combining average alcohol intake from diverse European populations - to judge the effects of moderate alcohol consumption on the risk of cancer for all populations. The investigators concluded that the risk of a number of types of cancer are increased even among subjects reporting no more than 20 grams of alcohol per day (up to about two typical drinks) - an amount they state to be within recommended levels of consumption (but exceed most countries low risk guidelines).

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Why wine is for you if you want to live longer - International Scientific Forum on Alcohol Research Critique 245 27 January 2021

The latest study to be considered by The International Scientific Forum on Alcohol Research looked to determine factors that affect the pattern of alcohol consumption (including the frequency of consumption, type of beverage, with or without food, etc.), rather than just the reported average amount of alcohol, related to all-cause mortality, major cardiovascular events-MACE (MI/stroke/cardiovascular death), accidents/injuries and liver cirrhosis, as well as all-cause and alcohol-related cancer incidence.

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Are wine drinkers cleverer than beer and spirits consumers? - International Scientific Forum on Alcohol Research Critique 244 18 December 2020

While a beneficial effect on cardiovascular disease of moderate drinking has been shown repeatedly in epidemiologic studies, the specific effects of different types of alcohol have not been well established.

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Alcohol & hypertension - What role does your diet play? - International Scientific Forum on Alcohol Research Critique 243 19 October 2020

The authors of a recent study tested the hypothesis that overall diet quality influences the association between alcohol consumption and the risk of hypertension. The report was based on data from the National Health & Nutrition Examination Survey in the US and two further studies in China.

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Latest research into alcohol and cancer has too many holes - International Scientific Forum on Alcohol Research Critique 242 5 October 2020

In an attempt to assess the relationship between light alcohol consumption (less than 12.5g per day) and the risk of a number of types of cancer, a recent report conducted a review of meta-analyses published within the last 15 years.

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Can alcohol consumption accelerate breast, ovarian cancer? - International Scientific Forum on Alcohol Research Critique 241 22 July 2020

The latest study to be considered by the International Scientific Forum on Alcohol Research used a 'Mendelian Randomisation' (MR) approach to try to determine if alcohol consumption is causally associated with the risk of female hormone-dependent cancers.

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Should worldwide alcohol consumption guidelines be reduced to one drink per day? - International Scientific Forum on Alcohol Research Critique 240 8 July 2020

A recent study to have been reviewed by the International Scientific Forum on Alcohol Research used very questionable data to suggest that drinking guidelines for all countries should be lowered to no more than one drink per day.

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Does the funding of research by alcohol companies lead to sponsorship bias? - International Scientific Forum on Alcohol Research Critique 239 28 May 2020

A recent study set out to evaluate sponsorship bias in observational alcohol research by focusing on a spectrum of health outcomes related to moderate alcohol consumption.

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Alcohol and cardiovascular heart disease - The impossibility of standardising confounders - International Scientific Forum on Alcohol Research Critique 238 8 April 2020

In a recent meta-analysis into alcohol consumption and the risk of coronary heart disease (CHD), the authors compared earlier studies for the number of potential confounding variables included in each paper.

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Will your alcohol consumption help or hinder you from reaching 90? - International Scientific Forum on Alcohol Research Critique 237 3 March 2020

An interesting and well-done study from a cohort of ageing men in the Netherlands that evaluated how alcohol consumption data collected at 68-to-70 years old related to the risk that the individual would survive to age 90.