There’s a common notion that light drinking or moderate drinking can actually make us healthier – a recent study busted the myths and dropped the truth bomb that it does not. In fact, any level of drinking alcohol is unhealthy for the body. A large study was conducted that defined light or moderate drinking as mean alcohol intake of up to 20 grams a day for men and up to 10 grams daily for women. However, even light drinking is responsible for accelerating the risk of cancer deaths in older adults.

How much alcohol is healthy?

The study was conducted for 12 years with a population of 135,103 adults aged 60 and older for 12 years. Dr. Rosario Ortolá, an assistant professor of preventive medicine and public health at Universidad Autónoma de Madrid and the lead author of the paper stated that the study didn’t find any beneficial relationship between mortality and low drinking habits. She further added that alcohol is responsible for raising the risk of cancer from its first drop.

US dietary guidelines on alcohol consumption

The current US dietary guidelines state that drinking less is healthier than drinking more. This comes at a time when deaths from excessive alcohol consumption have risen in the United States by 30 percent.

A year back, the Canadian Centre on Substance Use and Addiction issued a guideline stating that no amount of alcohol consumption is healthy. The World Health Organisation also declared that no alcohol, in no amount, is ever healthy. However, it added that most alcohol-related harms happen due to excessive, episodic drinking.

The study stated that older adults with light drinking faced more risk of dying. The study further added that moderate and light drinking is associated with higher risk of death from cancer and other causes – it also states that heavy drinking is also responsible for raising the risk of death from all causes, mainly cancer and cardiovascular diseases.

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