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

Female? Smoker? What you should know about alcohol consumption - International Scientific Forum on Alcohol Research Critique 215 14 May 2018

While essentially all epidemiologic studies have shown adverse health effects of cigarette smoking and beneficial effects of moderate alcohol consumption, a recent study in this area that followed a cohort of elderly women into very old age proved interesting reading.

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Should recommended alcohol consumption limits be reduced? - International Scientific Forum on Alcohol Research Critique 214 23 April 2018

Using individual-participant data from a number of large studies, predominantly from the UK and other European countries, the authors of a recent study have estimated the association between the reported level of alcohol intake among drinkers with cardiovascular outcomes and mortality.

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What effect does alcohol have on middle-aged and elderly women? - International Scientific Forum on Alcohol Research Critique 213 28 March 2018

The ISFAR has been studying recently-released research that looks at the effect alcohol has on cardiovascular disease and mortality among a very large number of middle-aged or elderly women.

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Could alcohol be damaging to your DNA? - International Scientific Forum on Alcohol Research Critique 211 23 January 2018

The latest research to go under The ISFAR's microscope concerns an extensive basic scientific experiment in mice. The authors of the paper describe the features and mutational landscape of DNA damage caused by acetaldehyde, an endogenous and alcohol-derived metabolite.

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Which alcohol category carries a lower risk of gastric cancer? - International Scientific Forum on Alcohol Research Critique 210 9 January 2018

While heavy alcohol intake has regularly been found to increase the risk of upper aero-digestive tract cancers (mouth, tongue, pharynx, larynx, etc), results are less clear for gastric cancer.

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Does alcohol make you fat? - International Scientific Forum on Alcohol Research Critique 209 14 December 2017

The public, and scientists, have long been concerned about the relation between alcohol consumption and weight gain, as all alcoholic beverages contain calories. However, most epidemiologic studies do not find that light or moderate drinkers weigh more than their abstaining peers, and some even show lower weight among moderate drinkers than among abstainers.

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The long-running battle to promote moderate drinking goes on - International Scientific Forum on Alcohol Research Critique 208 20 November 2017

A recently-released publication from the American Society of Clinical Oncology attempted to describe the relation between alcohol consumption and cancer, including the effects on the risk of developing cancer and effects among subjects currently being treated for cancer. It came to the conclusion that there is a need for the public to be warned about the use of alcohol because of its effects on cancer, and describes numerous approaches for decreasing alcohol use in the population.

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Is there a 'right' amount of alcohol to drink when pregnant? - International Scientific Forum on Alcohol Research Critique 207 6 November 2017

There is no question that high levels of alcohol consumption during pregnancy can lead to severe adverse effects on the foetus, with the most serious condition known as fetal alcohol syndrome (FAS). Many studies have also related alcohol intake during pregnancy with premature birth, low birth weight, and the infant being small for gestational age (SGA). Data on the effects of occasional or light drinking are not as clear, but most studies have not detected adverse effects.

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Why cultural differences are vital in gauging alcohol consumers' health - International Scientific Forum on Alcohol Research Critique 206 4 October 2017

It has been clearly shown that similar amounts of alcohol tend to have different health effects - both beneficial and adverse - in different cultures. Greater health benefits from moderate alcohol intake have been shown, for example, in southern European countries, where wine with meals is common, than in more northern European countries, where beer and spirits are more likely to be consumed and usually not with food.

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How much alcohol will kill you, and when? - International Scientific Forum on Alcohol Research Critique 205 5 September 2017

The most usual finding in longitudinal cohort studies has been that light-to-moderate consumers of alcohol tend to be at lower risk for total mortality, and show greater longevity of life, even when other lifestyle/demographic factors known to affect longevity are adjusted for in the analysis. A recent analysis is important as it presents data on the relation of alcohol intake to total mortality as well as to specific mortality from cardiovascular disease (CVD) and cancer for a very large number of subjects in the US.