Airborneguy, Tall Yortie.
The majority of the people posting in this thread consume 1-2 beers a night, wich might note ideal healthwise, but is within pretty much all the recommended limits for every industrialized nations. This is a freaking home brewing site: unless you are giving away all of your brew and make 2 batches a year, it is pretty much guaranteed that you're going to drink.
Recommended maximum per day and per week.
From he CDC FAQ:
What does moderate drinking mean ?There is no one definition of moderate drinking, but generally the term is used to describe a lower-risk pattern of drinking. According to the Dietary Guidelines for Americans,1 drinking in moderation is defined as having no more than 1 drink per day for women and no more than 2 drinks per day for men. This definition is referring to the amount consumed on any single day and is not intended as an average over several days.
I wonder why is that ? How, maybe it is because the health risks increase almost exponentially once you cross that line and actually get drunk on a regular basis (4+ units). Want proof, well you have this
study that shows an overall decrese in mortality in males over 40 that were within the limits of moderate consumption over non-drinkers. Binge drinkers (those who drank more than 2 a day reularly) were shown to have an increased mortality rate. Also, in the moderate drinking group, only 5% of the deaths were from the typical symptoms of daily alcohol consumption (liver disease, cancer and external causes of death).
This is a home brewing forum. It's pretty much guaranteed people are going to drink and general consensus is that most drink 1-2 a day. Sure, some drink more, but so do the general population: they don't need home brewers to make this study.
What I was underlying is that alcohol education is piss poor pretty much everywhere: daily alcol consumption is pretty much demonized while the risks associated with it, altough very real, are not fully understoodeven by the scientific community. Alcohol consumption is the cause of half the mature deaths of young Russian men
the most important cause being violence brought up by excessive alcohol consumption.
I repeat it: daily consumption is most assuredly not good for you in the long run. So is eating cheeseburgers, drinking soda, watching TV, taking yoru car everywhere, etc. Some of the people in this thread may have a drinking problem (or a budding one), but ther's really no contest that staying within the daily/weekly allowances guidelines is better than getting all of your hooch in one or two sittings a week.