Contrary to popular beliefs ascribed to alcohol and its adverse effects on one’s health, new research has surfaced about moderate drinking, and has most people talking on social media platforms. The research, which was published in the journal Dibetologia recently, suggests that moderate levels of alcohol drinking, not binge drinking, may be linked to a lower risk of developing diabetes.
In the study, researchers found that drinking alcohol three to four days a week was associated with a lower risk of diabetes compared with drinking less than one day a week. According to LiveScience, more than 76,000 adults participated in the Danish Health Examination Survey in 2007 to 2008. The people in the study filled out questionnaires about their drinking habits, including how much and how often they drank alcohol, and what type of alcohol they drank. Using information from the Danish National Diabetes Register, the researchers determined if the people in the study developed diabetes.
When the researchers looked at alcohol type, they found that different alcohol types were associated with different levels of risk. For example, drinking seven or more glasses of wine per week was associated with a 25 to 30 percent lower risk of diabetes compared with drinking less than one glass of wine per week.
Researchers further noted that they weren’t able to distinguish between type 1 diabetes and type 2 diabetes using the available data. However, it’s more common to develop type 2 diabetes as an adult than type 1 diabetes, which usually develops during childhood. The people in the study were tracked for a median of 4.9 years, wrote the researchers. Over this time period, about 850 men and 890 women developed diabetes.
The “findings suggest that alcohol drinking frequency is associated with risk of diabetes, and that consumption of alcohol over three to four days per week is associated with the lowest risk of diabetes, even after taking average weekly alcohol consumption into account,” the researchers, led by Charlotte Holst, a doctoral student of public health at the University of Southern Denmark, wrote.
The research also noted that it’s important to note, however, that most experts recommend that if you don’t already drink alcohol, you shouldn’t start because of possible health benefits.
