monkeymath
Well-Known Member
- Joined
- Jan 18, 2019
- Messages
- 701
- Reaction score
- 838
Just for fun, I found this: Relationship of Alcohol Consumption to All-Cause, Cardiovascular, and Cancer-Related Mortality in U.S. Adults - PubMed. It is open access so anyone should be able to read it. It is based on quite a large cohort (>300,000 participants) allowing best approximation of matching comparison groups. Here is the TL/DR from the abstract: "Conclusions: Light and moderate alcohol intake might have a protective effect on all-cause and CVD-specific mortality in U.S. adults. Heavy or binge drinking was associated with increased risk of all-cause and cancer-specific mortality."
The very basic question to ask yourself when looking at an observational study such as this one: in the society from which the participants are drawn, who abstains from alcohol? Alcohol is ubiquitous in most of Europe and, I imagine, the United States. To abstain from alcohol is usually an active decision which may often even have a negative impact on your social life, so you'll probably have some reason for it.
Now, some people simply do not like any alcoholic beverages, but one major impetus to eliminate your alcohol consumption entirely is health issues.
I don't think the people in this study died because they didn't drink, but the other way around.