Expert questions health value of drinking

Since we’re pretty meticulous about reporting the possible benefits of moderate drinking, it seems only fair to let a professor of epidemiology at the University of Auckland, in New Zealand, take the other side.

Dr. Rod Jackson and his colleagues make their case in an article in the Dec. 3 issue of The Lancet.

Jackson said that nondrinkers are different from light-to-moderate drinkers, who are also different from heavy drinkers. “So, it is likely that the apparent benefits of light-to-moderate drinking on the heart are overestimated because light-to-moderate drinkers are light-to-moderate in their other behaviors as well, which is giving them some of the observed benefits, rather than the alcohol,” he said.

[From Forbes.com]