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Having a quick review of this article, I can identify the following points:
There seem to be many sub-articles that are very long but poor on actual information. Some may be merged here. JFW | T@lk 09:50, 12 May 2008 (UTC)
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JFW |
T@lk
09:52, 12 May 2008 (UTC)I've added a very short psychological effects section to the article. I'll try and expand upon it but I could really use some decent sources to help? Regards, CycloneNimrod Talk? 11:11, 13 May 2008 (UTC)
I'm finding the differentiation between effects of light/moderate consumption vs abusive consumtion hard. We need some sort of structure e.g. two sections one for low consumption, one for heavy. Could be as two main sections, two sections per effect, or dare I say it as two articles :( LeeVJ ( talk) 22:03, 13 May 2008 (UTC)
I'm somewhat dismayed by the complete absence of acute and chronic pancreatitis in this article. Something else for this aspiring gut doctor to do... JFW | T@lk 08:56, 16 May 2008 (UTC)
Doesn't alcoholism damage the prefrontal cortex?
Liver disease and pancreatitis as the two major negative effects are missing sections. The article seems slanted towards the positive. 72.211.139.189 ( talk) 06:40, 12 June 2008 (UTC)
I would like to add a link to: www.talkingalcohol.com The damaging effects of alcohol are clearly displayed and are viewable to any person(s) 18 or over. Contributions/79.121.177.78 ( talk) 09:45, 15 June 2009 (UTC)
Please see a discussion here as to why this website does not meet WP:RS as an objective, third-party source: Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Spam/2008 Archive Aug 1#About 400 links to the two sites of one individual Flowanda | Talk 01:02, 24 July 2008 (UTC)
Okay, I'm taking out the section which currently reads:
with the reference
Please don't re-add it without careful consideration.
If you want to make an overall statement, it should be that no public health authority (that I'm aware of) recommends non-drinkers start consuming alcohol for health purposes, or alternatively a comparison of those (few) that do and those (nearly all) that don't. Note that a medical recommendation is itself a much weaker claim still than actual causation, and I do not believe even the weak claim, that a significant number of health professionals recommend alcohol consumption for non-drinkers in any case based on evidence-based medicine, rather than misinterpreted studies, is true.
In short, find a professor at a well-established university who tells people to drink alcohol, that it's good for them, and why, without misinterpreting statistics in an obvious fashion, and the claim can go in; otherwise, it's just outside the realm of evidence-based medicine. RandomP ( talk) 15:43, 23 November 2008 (UTC)
OK Here you go: How is the British Medical Journal? Association of alcohol consumption with selected cardiovascular disease outcomes: a systematic review and meta-analysis Paul E Ronksley, Susan E Brien, Barbara J Turner, Kenneth J Mukamal, William A Ghali BMJ 2011;342:d671 http://www.bmj.com/content/342/bmj.d671 http://www.bmj.com/highwire/filestream/376294/field_highwire_article_pdf/0/bmj.d671
BTW I am a real person who is a real physician. EtherDoc ( talk) 05:54, 26 December 2012 (UTC)
Hey, I am somewhat disturbed by the anti-alcohol POV in this article. Yes, physicians will not encourage non-drinkers to start in general, although the vast majority of physicians will admit that alcohol consumption has a well demonstrated benefit in overall longevity which has been documented for over 50 years now. Fact is that moderate (and maybe even high) alcohol consumption leads to significant decreases in cardiovascular death. Alcoholic cardiomyopathy occurs but is pretty rare, while ischemic heart disease and cardiac failure are very common. Over half the population dies from cardiovascular causes, and alcohol consumption (even in alcoholics) appears to have a benefit in coronary artery disease. Full disclosure: I am a physician and a moderate alcohol drinker. EtherDoc ( talk) 05:14, 26 December 2012 (UTC)
The above paragraph is incorrect. Heavy alcholics rarely ever have coronary atherosclerosis. They much more often die from lung disease as most of them also smoke considerably. EtherDoc ( talk) 05:14, 26 December 2012 (UTC)
Reply: Again, there is overwhelming epidemiological evidence of health BENEFIT associated with moderate alcohol consumption. Study after study has shown decreased cardiovascular disease and death. Overall longevity (all causes) is increased. Sure alcoholism is serious and associated with many medical and psychiatric problems, but the majority of alcohol consumers do not develop alcoholism. See http://www.bmj.com/highwire/filestream/376294/field_highwire_article_pdf/0/bmj.d671 EtherDoc ( talk) 20:44, 30 December 2012 (UTC)
As the article stands (27th Nov 2008), some sections focus solely on moderate consumption, with complete disregard to the effects of heavy consumption. For instance, the section "cardiovascular system" and the subsections "Cardiovascular disease"; "Coronary Heart Disease"; "Coronary Vascular Disease" ; "Peripheral Arterial Disease" ; "Intermittent claudication (IC)" ; "Heart attack and stroke", moderate consumption levels were discussed, but no mention was made of the effects of heavy consumption. Consequently, these sections are overwhelmingly positive, whereas discussion of heavy consumption would highlight deleterious effects.
This is not intended to be an article on the long-term effects of 'moderate' alcohol consumption - it is an article on long-term effects generally. The selective attention to moderate consumption biases the article.
NcLean 114.76.96.115 ( talk) 23:27, 26 November 2008 (UTC)
Strongly disagree. Agree it is important to differentiate between less common heavy consumption of alcohol, and the vast majority of alcohol consumption which is less than heavy consumption. Are there medical questions about the cardiovascular benefits of moderate alcohol consumption? No. These benefits are well documented. Are there medical questions about the deleterious effects of heavy alcohol consumption? No. These deleterious effects are well documented. Are there individuals who are confused and think that all alcohol consumption is problematic? Yes. They have shortened life spans. EtherDoc,MD (not employed by the alcohol industry) EtherDoc ( talk) 20:55, 30 December 2012 (UTC)
This is possibly the worst Wikipedia article I've ever seen, and that's pretty bad. Who wrote it, the Alcoholic Beverage Association? Study after study, reference after reference, trying to state some f***ing positive aspect of alcohol consumption. Alcohol is a f***ing poison. It is habit forming and addictive to some people. To say that there are any positive effects is a f***ing lie by the peddlers of this shit. No single substance causes as much loss of productivity, crime, and destruction as alcohol. The people who write this sh*t need to have their bottles taken away for good, you self justifying pr**ks.—Preceding unsigned comment added by 75.18.183.226 ( talk • contribs)
Your vehemence against alcohol is almost like that of a former alcoholic (who tend to be the most anti-alcohol people you'll ever meet because they think that everyone is like them and cannot handle it). You are wrong on several counts. In "moderation" alcohol does not have a huge amount of negative effects, which should be stated in the article. I agree that the negative consequences of long term heavy drinking should be cleaer though. (BTW, a lot of things that we ingest or are exposed to are "poisons" in their own right - it is the dosage and length of exposure that is important). There are a few "poisons" or "toxic substances" that can have beneficial effects in small quantities - for example Hydrogen Sulphide's potential use in heart disease. Saying that it is a "f**cking lie" to say alcohol may have some positive effects is quite frankly anti-science and NPOV in itself, as you are coming from a biased viewpoint. —Preceding unsigned comment added by GimpyFauxHippy ( talk • contribs) 12:24, 11 March 2010 (UTC)
I completely agree, most NPOV article I've seen on wikipedia. Someone should really rewrite. 99.255.5.248 ( talk) 21:33, 13 March 2009 (UTC)
I have done quite a bit of a rewrite and have removed a lot of biased and poorly sourced info, please make further suggestions of how the article can be further improved. Also please do consider registering an account and using reliable sources, eg pubmed for finding medical papers to quote to cover the impacts of heavy drinking. I was surprised at just how biased the article was when I read it in full. A lot of it was just copied and pasted, entire sections were copied and pasted quotes. Occasionally a short quote or two can be justified but a good third of this article was copied and pasted quotes, total copyright violation. I have reduced the amount of quoted text.-- Literaturegeek | T@1k? 04:12, 14 March 2009 (UTC)
Ok I just did another major rewrite and got most of the bias out or added more up to date review articles. I think that it is clear that alcohol has some benefits at low levels for the general public but the way it was written by added by David J. Hanson who's funded by Distilled Spirits Council of the United States and who used sockpuppets, was basically a propaganda piece and highly biased. I think the remaining health benefits should stay but perhaps some research of the medical literature for the adverse effects of heavy use can be added.-- Literaturegeek | T@1k? 07:14, 14 March 2009 (UTC)
Thanks for your work Literaturegeek. It certainly is an improvement. However, I would still say the article is quite NPOV. Not that any of the information is necessarily wrong (that I know of), but just the amount of space dedicated to benefits vs. risks is still very unbalanced.
As to a more specific comment, the cancer section should be clarified. One source claims alcohol is a carcinogen, one claims it is not. Also, perhaps this recent study should be included: http://professional.cancerconsultants.com/oncology_main_news.aspx?id=43299 99.255.5.248 ( talk) 10:50, 14 March 2009 (UTC)
It seems that some people are very angry about any article that doesn't describe alcohol as evil. Given the fact that certain denominations of Christianity denounce the use of alcohol, it seems that there is a natural source for bias. This is just as ridiculous as the people who try to attack the evolution article as "NPOV" or biased. —Preceding unsigned comment added by PuckSR ( talk • contribs) 03:12, 9 December 2009 (UTC)
AA and other groups do have an anti alcohol viewpoint, and I would say some of it is almost religiously inspired. In short, there's bias and exaggeration on both sides. Alcohol isn't the cure for all ills, but it isn't always as bad as others would have you believe. GimpyFauxHippy ( talk) 13:08, 11 March 2010 (UTC)
This page originated as a discussion of the controversy surrounding possible health benefits of moderate alcohol consumption. For the discussion page on earlier versions of the article, click here.
This may account in large part for the perceived imbalance of the article. It would benefit from being re-written by a subject matter expert. 147.114.226.180 ( talk) 14:34, 13 March 2009 (UTC)
Thanks that explains it. I figured out who was behind the biased edits to this article, see section above.-- Literaturegeek | T@1k? 07:16, 14 March 2009 (UTC)
I have done a number of edits over the past few weeks to the article to bring back balance to the articles. Previously there was a lot of people complaining over the years about the severe pro-bias of the article in favour of alcohol being a wonder drug. Whilst alcohol does appear to have some health benefits at low doses tese were greatly inflated and almost entirely to the exclusion of the serious health problems associated with excessive alcohol use. No doubt further improvements can be made to the article but as I don't believe that there are any serious overall issues remaining regarding neutrality I have removed the tags. If anyone disagrees feel free to point out remaining issues and if necessary readd the tags.-- Literaturegeek | T@1k? 11:16, 3 April 2009 (UTC)
No offence intended to the authors/editors of this article but i noticed a certain change in attitude about the positives and negatives of this article. In the start of this article i noticed that the authors/editors were very pesimestic towards the long term effects of eccesive consumption of alcohol but then you started to become more optimistic "Two recent studies report that the more alcohol consumed, the lower the risk of developing rheumatoid arthritis" having positive attitudes towards eccesive consumption of alcohol. Maybe there was some outside influence in this sudden change in attitude??? Ulyanov322 ( talk) 01:00, 4 May 2009 (UTC)
Thank you for your comments. Previously this article was severely biased in favour of chronic daily alcohol consumption but largely omitted the harmful effects. I removed a lot of the bias and added in the harms of alcohol. I didn't remove some of the positive effects which were cited because I was unable to find refs which disputed those claims. It seems factual that alcohol reduces rheumatoid arthritis. Alcohol however, increases the risk of gouty arthritis so that section is relatively neutral anyway. What changes do you think should be done to the article?-- Literaturegeek | T@1k? 05:59, 4 May 2009 (UTC)
There seems to be a serious lack of information in regards to the negative effects of alcohol on the brain. I have a hard time believing that alcohol is harmless to the brain and if that is the case, it's very well worth noting in fine detail [test results, medical research, etc]. Things like "atrophy", just don't cut it. What's the quantity of atrophy? What's the cause [a.k.a. the mechanism of action]? IMO, this article leaves much to be desired in this regard.
—Preceding
unsigned comment added by
76.202.194.131 (
talk)
08:38, 3 June 2009 (UTC)
Talking Alcohol is an informative and useful website highlighting the damaging effects of alcohol. The negative effects are clearly displayed and are viewable to any person(s) 18 or over. Contributions/79.121.177.78 ( talk) 09:53, 15 June 2009 (UTC)
The title should be a little more specific here. Most of the article deals with the effects of long-term alcohol abuse so that (or at very least "consumption") should be more clear from its name. I'd also remove ad hoc references to the benefits of moderate consumption for the same reason. -- mikaul talk 10:54, 30 July 2009 (UTC)
I agree, and this article badly needs more medical research evidence and less reliance on public health guidelines which are as much to do with effecting change in the public's behaviour as with the medical evidence. This is an encyclopedia not a public health agency's website [user:Byronsharp] 13 December 2009.
So, two years ago I found this article in utter disarray: apparently, it began life as something called "Moderate Drinking Controversy" as the brainchild of some very one-sided research, and with the addition of some countervailing data it had become "Alcohol and Health." I reworked it completely, deleting a bunch of useless information and trying to coral the gluttonous article into clean, cogent sections [1], and renamed it "Long-term Effects of Alcohol" to reflect its core content. Now two years later I return to find that it's been completely revamped to include solid medical data (of which I had none) with the expertise of those who understand the field (which I do not). But, awesomely, the structure I parsed still remains. Really, this is near miraculous – it's like writing a doctoral thesis by just putting some subheadings on a sheet of paper and waiting for the text to spontaneously coalesce.
Isn't Wikipedia amazing? -- Xiaphias ( talk) 19:56, 20 December 2009 (UTC)
There is a wealth of credible scientific evidence demonstrating the health benefits of moderate alcohol intake and yet this article still feels biased against the health benefits of moderate drinking. At the very least, as someone else suggested, it should be renamed to something which reflects its current purpose which is mostly to discuss the negative effects of alcohol abuse. This is a disappointment. -- 68.105.141.111 ( talk) 18:12, 19 March 2010 (UTC)
(outdent) 75.80.128.222, there are no issues of ownership; as can be seen in the conversation above I invited the editor to contribute using references to the article. Likewise you are invited to contribute to the article, using well referenced content. WP:MEDRS is the sourcing guideline that should be used for this article.-- Literaturegeek | T@1k? 15:17, 29 June 2010 (UTC)
It appears to be the opposite now. It mostly talks about the good effects of alcohol. ( 207.6.166.24 ( talk) 23:25, 2 January 2012 (UTC))
Shouldn't the effects on magnesium, potassium, etc be included as a metabolic effect?-- 192.77.126.50 ( talk) 13:20, 24 September 2010 (UTC)
I am talking about the whole article, but i will give just a few examples.
Here is from the alcohol and stroke section.
Compared to abstaining, drinking in moderation is associated with an increased risk of stroke. Light drinking offers no benefits in prevention of stroke.[50]
The reference leads as to a news article by BBC.
However, if you we go a database of scientific literature such as PubMed and check out the reviews on alcohol and stroke here is what the latest articles will be about.
"An inverse association between moderate alcohol intake and cardiovascular risk, in particular coronary disease and ischemic stroke, has been demonstrated in many epidemiologic studies"
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/19715411
"Light-to-moderate drinking is probably unrelated to increased risk of any cardiovascular condition and is related to lower risks of CAD, ischemic stroke and CAD-related heart failure. A protective alcohol-CAD hypothesis is supported by plausible biological mechanisms attributable to ethyl alcohol. "
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/19419257
"This review focuses on the most recent studies that show the association of environmental factors, nutrition, alcohol, tobacco, education, lifestyle and behavior with the risk of vascular disease, including ischemic stroke and cerebral hemorrhage. The link between air pollution and stroke risk has become evident. Low education levels and depression are established as risk factors. This is also true for heavy alcohol consumption, although moderate drinking may be protective"
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/19715411
"An extensive body of data shows concordant J-shaped associations between alcohol intake and a variety of adverse health outcomes, including coronary heart disease, diabetes, hypertension, congestive heart failure, stroke, dementia, Raynaud's phenomenon, and all-cause mortality."
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/17825708
"Epidemiological studies of middle-aged populations generally find the relationship between alcohol intake and the risk of coronary heart disease (CHD) and stroke to be either U- or J-shaped. "
"The consistency in the vascular benefit associated with moderate drinking (compared with non-drinking) observed across different studies, together with the existence of credible biological pathways, strongly suggests that at least some of this benefit is real. However, because of biases introduced by: choice of reference categories; reverse causality bias; variations in alcohol intake over time; and confounding, some of it is likely to be an artefact. "
"While regular moderate alcohol consumption during middle-age probably does reduce vascular risk, care should be taken when making general recommendations about safe levels of alcohol intake."
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/17326330
There are all independent reviews of primary source articles done by real scientists. All of the quoted articles are fresh 2006-2010.
As far as I remember this wikipedia article: some of these references were present here, but deleted.
In this case and in many other cases the expressed view in this article contradicts the scientific literature. Sure, the cause-relationship may not be proven, as it requires specific randomized trials, but, as I have allready quoted "The consistency in the vascular benefit associated with moderate drinking (compared with non-drinking) observed across different studies, together with the existence of credible biological pathways, strongly suggests that at least some of this benefit is real"
A rather neutral phrase can be found at the national stroke association web site:
"Scientists are still figuring out how alcohol use can be linked to stroke. The most important thing to remember is that a doctor is the best resource for determining how alcohol use will affect stroke risk. In some studies, drinking lots of alcohol has been negatively linked to stroke. For example, more than 2 drinks per day may increase stroke risk by 50%. Other studies have indicated that 1 alcoholic drink a day may lower a person’s risk for stroke, provided that there is no other medical reason for avoiding alcohol. Although recommendations for moderate alcohol consumption range from 1 to 2 drinks per day, the vast majority of healthcare professionals agree that drinking more than one to two drinks each day can increase stroke risk and lead to other medical problems, including heart and liver disease, and possibly brain damage"
http://www.stroke.org/site/PageServer?pagename=Alcohol
Thus the best evidence we have shows us that in terms of stroke, the risk may increase if we drink a lot and does not increase if we drink 1-2 drinks per day and may even decrease with that amount.
Compare this to this misinterpretation:
"Compared to abstaining, drinking in moderation is associated with an increased risk of stroke. Light drinking offers no benefits in prevention of stroke" - Wikipedia
We observe a better situation, yet still an absurd one here:
"Some research has claimed the all-cause mortality rates may be 16 to 28% lower among moderate drinkers (1–2 drinks per day) than among abstainers.[14][15][16][17] New York Times journalist Roni Caryn Rabin reasons that the statistics of this research are flawed.[18]"
Why is a journalists oppinion (I myself am as well a journalist) treated on equal grounds as the evidence in epidemiological studies, provided by real scientists? How about I write an aticle in press about bananas being bad for your health (for example: the benefits of bananas are exagerated by the pro-banana farmers lobby, while actually they cause cancer") and we add a link to that to the wikipedia article about bananas?
Sure some studies may be and are flawed, however, there are a lot of high-quality meta-analysis, that review the high quality studies and come to the same conclusions (which are by the way not refered to).
I will give one example:
"The selection of nondrinkers as a reference group has been questioned because this group may include ex-drinkers who stopped drinking because of health problems. A subgroup analysis restricted to studies that excluded either ex-drinkers or very light drinkers from the reference group generated a pooled curve that indeed predicted a lower (though statistically significant) protection, confirming the importance of properly selecting the reference group in studies on alcohol and health"
"In conclusion, this meta-analysis confirms the hazards of excess drinking but also indicates the existence of potential windows of alcohol intake that may confer a net beneficial effect of drinking, at least in terms of survival, both in men and in women. Heavy drinkers should be urged to cut their consumption, but people who already regularly consume low to moderate amounts of alcohol should be encouraged to continue."
"The degree of association was lower in adjusted studies, as might be expected in view of several confounding factors characterizing observational studies on drinking habits; however, the benefit of light to moderate drinking remained in a range of undoubted public health value (15%-18%). Although residual confounding cannot be excluded, it would be very unlikely to modify the scenario in a substantial manner. We found indeed that when adjusted and unadjusted data derived from the same studies were compared, the maximum protection conferred by light to moderate drinking only decreased from 19% to 16%; we can thus presume that, even in the pessimistic hypothesis that residual confounding would have the same strength in lowering the protection as that of known confounding, the "real" (maximum) protection against total mortality associated with low levels of alcohol consumption would still be higher than 10%."
http://archinte.ama-assn.org/cgi/content/full/166/22/2437
The number of deleted links to peer-reviewed reviews and articles (see old history) in this wikipedia article as well as the amount of misinterpretations of actual studies truly amazes and does not encourage editing of this article personally.
I believe this article requires serious re-editing by someone with more nerves than I have.
Scinquisitor ( talk) 15:43, 19 January 2011 (UTC)
It is something to start with, however the problem I issued is not solved.
It was said that
"to make the article more compliant with WP:MEDRS often means replacing old often primary research with newer peer reviewed secondary sources"
However, going back to strokes:
Wikipedia: "A 2003 Johns Hopkins study has linked moderate alcohol use to brain shrinkage and did not find any reduced risk of stroke among moderate drinkers"
Yet newer 2006-2010 peer-reviewed reviews I quoted above do suggest a reduced risk among light drinkers. Will there be any objections if I add something like "However several more recent reviews suggest that there is J-shaped associations between alcohol intake and the risk of stroke" with the mentioned references? I would also add a link to the Stroke association web site, saying that more than 1-2 drinks is bad and 1-2 is ok and maybe even good (according to some studies).
Also, I'm new to wikipedia editing, so I'm not sure how to deal with such things:
"Excessive alcohol consumption in Russia, particularly by men, has in recent years caused more than half of all the deaths at ages 15-54 years."
This claim appears bogus, despite being published in a respected peer-reviewed journal.
This original article "Alcohol and cause-specific mortality in Russia: a retrospective case–control study of 48 557 adult deaths" contains an interesting quote:
"These corrected percentages are similar to those shown in tables 4 and 5, and were not materially affected by finer stratification for potential confounders (AMOUNT SMOKED, year of death, years since death, marital status, relationship to informant, ethnicity, education, occupation, socioeconomic status, or recent change in socioeconomic status)"
Basically the authors "show" but do not mention that in their study smoking had no material effect on mortality. This contradicts with what Sir Richard Doll had tride to prove for such a long time. I mean "smoking kills".
The same table 4 of this article reveals to us that those who don't drink at all are at a more significant risk of death from all causes except for alcohol poisoning comparing to those drinking less than a bottle of vodka per week (even the alcohol industry does not make such claims). After this weird observation is explained with something like "some non-drinkers actually drink a lot and hide it from us" (not a quote - see text for real context) the non-drinkers are omitted from the analysis and ... well you know the rest.
This actually explains to me why the reference to this article is some kind of big abstract/ press release, not the complete Lancet study (The Lancet, Volume 373, Issue 9682, Pages 2201 - 2214, 27 June 2009).
So my question is... (if anyone can answer) can this article be used in the smoking article as proof that smoking doesn't affect mortality rates in Russia? Or maybe there is some kind of procedure that allows some kind of experts (I don't claim to be one) to evaluate if peer-reviewed articles are coherent?
Has anyone actually read the article except for me, to confirm or not confirm my findings of weirdness?
"I am not sure how far back you are going in the article history "
One or two years ago. Something like that. At that time the article contained much more credible peer-reviewed sources on most subjects and much less speculations. It was also somewhat biased (there was little criticism of the data), but atleast everything was consistent and linked to multiple independent scientific studies.
Scinquisitor ( talk) 22:46, 19 January 2011 (UTC)
Author(s): Soerjomataram I, de Vries E, Coebergh JW Source: LANCET Volume: 374 Issue: 9694 Pages: 975-975 Published: SEP 19 2009. Also something to concider. Scinquisitor ( talk) 19:58, 20 January 2011 (UTC)
Just realised that this referenced part was deleted:
"Some research has claimed the all-cause mortality rates may be 16 to 28% lower among moderate drinkers (1–2 drinks per day) than among abstainers.[14][15][16][17] New York Times journalist Roni Caryn Rabin reasons that the statistics of this research are flawed.[18]"
I only objected to the journalist article. The claim that "all-cause mortality rates may be 16 to 28% lower among moderate drinkers" is supported by more recent meta-analysis such as this one: http://archinte.ama-assn.org/cgi/content/full/166/22/2437 and relativly new research articles such as this one: "Ann Epidemiol. 2007. Volume 17, Issue 5. Alcohol Drinking and Total Mortality Risk Arthur L. Klatsky, MD, Natalia Udaltsova, PhD". The newer numbers would be "15 to 18%" protection.
I think this information should be returned to the article with these new references (as well as the old ones). Total mortality is one of the most important long-term effects of alcohol and such studies should not be disregarded. Any objections? Scinquisitor ( talk) 16:58, 20 January 2011 (UTC)
"There have been no randomised controlled trials to demonstrate the cardio benefits of alcohol"
This statement (as many other similar statements in this article concernings such trials) is true.
However, there have been no randomised trials to demonstrate many other intersting things.
For example. The evidence that smoking causes lung cancer is based on epidemiological studies not on randomised controlled trials (please correct me If i'm wrong and such studies exist).
From the article on smoking:
"Richard Doll in 1950 published research in the British Medical Journal showing a close link between smoking and lung cancer.[25] Four years later, in 1954 the British Doctors Study, a study of some 40 thousand doctors over 20 years, confirmed the suggestion, based on which the government issued advice that smoking and lung cancer rates were related.[26]"
25 and 26 are epidemiological studies (good ones).
Despite the fact, that these studies and further studies are epidemiological, nobody in the right mind would say something like: "no randomised controlled trials demonstrate that smoking causes lung cancer". Not because the statement isn't true. It is. But because epidemiological studies are regared as fair scientific evidence for causation and is the best evidence we can get. We know that smoking causes lung cancer from the observed difference in mortality between smokers and non-smokers plus some plausible biological mechanisms.
The same argument can be applied to the role of excessive alcohol consumption and (for example) breast cancer. There is epidemiological evidence. There are no randomised controlled trials to prove this. And there will never be such trials due to ethical issues. Yet, I think it's fair to warn people, that there is a link between alcohol and brest cancer.
So the current reasoning contains double standards. The current version of the article seems to invoke the "no randomised controlled trials" argument when we talk abot benefits of alcohol, but disregards this argument when we talk about ill effects, such as cancer, which are actually based on the same kind of evidence (with a few exceptions such as alhocol poisoning).
I'm new to wikipedia, so I don't know what it sais in the rules about this. So I merely express my oppinion for consideration:
To remove double standards issues and make the article more neutral, one of two policies should be chosen:
a.) Epidemiological evidence is enough to confirm potential cause of effect if biologically plausible mechanisms are provided. In this case phrases such as "There have been no randomised controlled trials to demonstrate the cardio benefits of alcohol" are true, but misleading and should not be used as an argument.
b.) Epidemiological evidence is not enough and randomised controlled trials are required to confirm cause of effect for anything. In this case we can add "There have been no randomised controlled trials to demonstrate the alcohol consumption leads to X" where X is... well X is allmost anything.
Any oppinions? Scinquisitor ( talk) 13:59, 20 January 2011 (UTC)
I'm aware that alcohol abuse causes a form of cushing's syndrome. With no knowledge on the pathophysiology behind this, I don't feel I can write about it. Can an expert on the subject offer some info? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 130.88.23.77 ( talk) 11:11, 23 January 2011 (UTC)
This is simply ridiculous. Modern science and medicine officially recognize the benefits for human health of moderate alcohol consumption. But, even with common sense and avoiding the idiotic alarmism of certain anglo-saxon "scientists", 3,000 years of Mediterranean diet should at least teach something to the World, considering the extremely low cancer rates in the so called " wine belt". It's really a SHAME that someone writes bullshits like that. Someone should denounce these charlatans. I nominate the sentence for deletion. -- Conte di Cavour ( talk) 16:17, 3 March 2011 (UTC)
"Alcohol should be regarded as a recreational drug with potentially serious adverse effects on health and it is not recommended for cardio-protection in the place of safer and proved traditional methods such as a balanced diet, exercise and pharmacotherapy." - Is this sentence written in the correct style? 85.210.182.62 ( talk) 00:21, 25 April 2011 (UTC)
Well, yes it is written as a moralistic sermon rather than as an informative neutral statement. More importantly it is incorrect. EtherDoc ( talk) 02:21, 17 January 2013 (UTC)
Regardless of whether or not moderate alcohol consumption is beneficial for adults, alcohol exposure in adolescence, particularly in a chronic intermittent binge-type pattern, has negative effects on brain development. However, there was a complete lack of information on how alcohol effects brain development on this page. I added content to address a couple possible cellular mechanisms behind alcohol's effect on the adolescent brain, which is different than its effect on the fetal or adult brain. Cekeating ( talk) 19:49, 3 December 2011 (UTC)
I provided information regarding the molecular actions of ethanol in regards to essential tremor. I then provided a link to the essential tremor page where more in depth cellular mechanisms are explained. JChanelo ( talk) 04:44, 15 December 2011 (UTC)
Hi, the german version of this article is, while still being related, on a different topic. Does anybody know how to correct that? thx— Preceding unsigned comment added by Panconojos ( talk • contribs) 17:30, 17 December 2011 (UTC)
Nowhere in the article is it specified that alcohol is used in place of ethanol, even though this article is linked to by at least one which is discussing different types of alcohol. This should be clarified in the lead or alcohol should be changed to read ethanol. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alcohol#Toxicity Testem ( talk) 16:27, 20 February 2012 (UTC)
As far as I know alcohol inhibits protein synthesis which could undo desired effects on muscular tissue from physical training
If anyone has time to write a paragraph about that this would be a nice source http://ajpendo.physiology.org/content/277/2/E268.full — Preceding unsigned comment added by Mikeschaerer ( talk • contribs) 13:59, 16 July 2012 (UTC)
Dec 31, 2012 Sminthopsis84 undid my edit commenting "Reverted the unexplained removal of medical risks such as cancer, fetal injury, etc."
My edit was valid because: Cancer and fetal injury are already in the paragraph above. Hypertension removed since alcohol in general improves hypertension. Much of the contribution seem biased. I will continue to edit this article hoping to simplfy, and present a scientific-medical perspective without bias toward or against alcohol. EtherDoc ( talk) 20:52, 1 January 2013 (UTC)
I have left your reversion essentially as is. Well I'd like to think I'm a mainstream doctor. I take care of patients (and monitor their blood pressure every five minutes) everyday, and am quite familiar with the physiology of hypertension. Sure alcoholics have increased sympathetic tone. I use this often as a way to determine which patients are alcoholics. But these are patients with fairly significant alcohol consumption. Moderate drinkers don't get hypertension from their alcohol consumption, and likely have less overall hypertension. I'll add some references. And actually many physicians (including mine and myself) although not overly encouraging alcohol consumption, are fully accepting of their patients current moderate consumption realizing its general benefits. EtherDoc ( talk) 23:03, 1 January 2013 (UTC)
As of January 2013 this article continues to have a strong anti-alcohol POV. Much of this seems to be from the addiction/psychological literature which naturally is concerned with alcohol dependence and the many problems associated with alcoholism. Talking about the well documented (and progressively better understood) benefits of moderate consumption is perhaps frightening to these groups. But Wikipedia should maintain a NPOV and simply present unbiased medical evidence, even if it contradicts the absolute anti-alcohol viewpoint of those in the addiction treatment fields. EtherDoc ( talk) 22:03, 15 January 2013 (UTC)
Concerning alcohol causing chronic fatique (not chronic fatique syndrome), fair enough. Fatique has many causes and alcohol consumption should be at least explored as part of workup. EtherDoc ( talk) 15:28, 19 January 2013 (UTC)
Why did you choose the word 'disturbing' for this talk section title? That is a very strong word and implies you are very upset and troubled about this article.-- MrADHD | T@1k? 22:44, 19 January 2013 (UTC)
Disturbing because it often seems one sided and emotional. I prefer a scientific viewpoint. There are many many problems associated with alcohol abuse as described in this article. I have not removed any of these valid concerns. But there is an implied if not explicit suggestion in some contributions that the best course is to avoid alcohol completely. The literature in no way supports this except perhaps related to pregnancy. I have seen and taken care of many alcoholics and seen children with FAS (thankfully somewhat rare in the US currently) My background is in biochemistry, medicine-almost 30 years, and brain chemistry in particular. I simply want dispassionate contributions. BTW I have tried to improve the section on cancer since there is concern for alcohol promoting certain cancers. EtherDoc ( talk) 22:46, 22 January 2013 (UTC)
Well, truth is I have already fixed many of the concerns I had. And these changes apparently have been mostly kept. The words I wrote above were partly to explain the changes I made. I feel the article is reasonable at this point although some further organizing might be needed. Section on kidney stones might be labeled renal for example. The article now has a fair amount of info on benefits and deleterious effects. :) EtherDoc ( talk) 01:18, 23 January 2013 (UTC)
Adding new New England Journal of Medicine study on significant benefit of Mediteranian diet. This is relevant since physicians randomized patients and included a RECOMMENDATION for daily wine consumption. OK, the diets were different (low fat diets are generally unhealthy) but this study is interesting precisely because subjects were instructed to drink daily. EtherDoc ( talk) 00:47, 26 February 2013 (UTC)
This is still a biased, anti-alcohol article. Most of it consists of discussion about harmful effects of excess consumption of alcohol, but any substance whatsoever, including water, is harmful if consumed in excessive quantity. This is not specific to alcohol.
Of course there are people in our culture who damage their health by ingesting too much alcohol, just as there are people in our culture who damage their health by ingesting too many hamburgers or too much sugary soda. But the long-term health benefits of drinking small to moderate amounts (corresponding to a glass of wine per day) of alcohol are clear, documented, and well-established. Unfortunately there seems to be a section of the community which holds neo-Puritan attitudes, and looks for excuses to label anything enjoyable as harmful. Driven by their bias, they are overactive contributors to Wikipedia. Sayitclearly ( talk) 07:26, 8 January 2014 (UTC)
A new study released in July 2014 used the mendelian randomization design to avoid some problems posed by observational studies. Their findings were that gene loci which are strongly associated with a propensity to consume less alcohol are also associated with lower risk of coronary heart diseases. This suggests that the effect of moderate alcohol consumption on coronary heart diseases is probably confounded by genetic differences. The study also questions the association between higher HDL and coronary heart disease. Although this study is a primary study the clever study design, the converse findings in terms of moderate alcohol consumption on cardiovascular disease and the very large sample size (> 260'000 participants) would justify to at least mention this study in the Wikipedia article about the Long term effect of alcohol. Any comments? http://www.bmj.com/content/349/bmj.g4164 Mikeschaerer ( talk) 19:57, 4 November 2014 (UTC)
OK we get it. C elegans is used in experiments of longevity. The actual gene sequence homology between worms and humans is not germane to this article. Suffice to say that C elegans is an accepted model of aging studies. Keep it concise! EtherDoc ( talk) 20:02, 9 March 2013 (UTC)
Alcohol seems to be overall beneficial starting from certain ages only, namely 35 for males and 45 for females. Before, there's a linear positive relationship between alcohol consumption and death risk. Also, gender seems to influence strongly the relationship between alcohol intake and ischaemic/emorrhagic stroke risk. http://pubs.niaaa.nih.gov/publications/arh27-1/39-51.htm http://www.bmj.com/content/325/7357/191 — Preceding unsigned comment added by 5.68.240.61 ( talk) 18:00, 9 February 2014 (UTC)
This is an archive of past discussions. Do not edit the contents of this page. If you wish to start a new discussion or revive an old one, please do so on the current talk page. |
Archive 1 | Archive 2 | Archive 3 |
Having a quick review of this article, I can identify the following points:
There seem to be many sub-articles that are very long but poor on actual information. Some may be merged here. JFW | T@lk 09:50, 12 May 2008 (UTC)
{{
cite journal}}
: CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (
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JFW |
T@lk
09:52, 12 May 2008 (UTC)I've added a very short psychological effects section to the article. I'll try and expand upon it but I could really use some decent sources to help? Regards, CycloneNimrod Talk? 11:11, 13 May 2008 (UTC)
I'm finding the differentiation between effects of light/moderate consumption vs abusive consumtion hard. We need some sort of structure e.g. two sections one for low consumption, one for heavy. Could be as two main sections, two sections per effect, or dare I say it as two articles :( LeeVJ ( talk) 22:03, 13 May 2008 (UTC)
I'm somewhat dismayed by the complete absence of acute and chronic pancreatitis in this article. Something else for this aspiring gut doctor to do... JFW | T@lk 08:56, 16 May 2008 (UTC)
Doesn't alcoholism damage the prefrontal cortex?
Liver disease and pancreatitis as the two major negative effects are missing sections. The article seems slanted towards the positive. 72.211.139.189 ( talk) 06:40, 12 June 2008 (UTC)
I would like to add a link to: www.talkingalcohol.com The damaging effects of alcohol are clearly displayed and are viewable to any person(s) 18 or over. Contributions/79.121.177.78 ( talk) 09:45, 15 June 2009 (UTC)
Please see a discussion here as to why this website does not meet WP:RS as an objective, third-party source: Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Spam/2008 Archive Aug 1#About 400 links to the two sites of one individual Flowanda | Talk 01:02, 24 July 2008 (UTC)
Okay, I'm taking out the section which currently reads:
with the reference
Please don't re-add it without careful consideration.
If you want to make an overall statement, it should be that no public health authority (that I'm aware of) recommends non-drinkers start consuming alcohol for health purposes, or alternatively a comparison of those (few) that do and those (nearly all) that don't. Note that a medical recommendation is itself a much weaker claim still than actual causation, and I do not believe even the weak claim, that a significant number of health professionals recommend alcohol consumption for non-drinkers in any case based on evidence-based medicine, rather than misinterpreted studies, is true.
In short, find a professor at a well-established university who tells people to drink alcohol, that it's good for them, and why, without misinterpreting statistics in an obvious fashion, and the claim can go in; otherwise, it's just outside the realm of evidence-based medicine. RandomP ( talk) 15:43, 23 November 2008 (UTC)
OK Here you go: How is the British Medical Journal? Association of alcohol consumption with selected cardiovascular disease outcomes: a systematic review and meta-analysis Paul E Ronksley, Susan E Brien, Barbara J Turner, Kenneth J Mukamal, William A Ghali BMJ 2011;342:d671 http://www.bmj.com/content/342/bmj.d671 http://www.bmj.com/highwire/filestream/376294/field_highwire_article_pdf/0/bmj.d671
BTW I am a real person who is a real physician. EtherDoc ( talk) 05:54, 26 December 2012 (UTC)
Hey, I am somewhat disturbed by the anti-alcohol POV in this article. Yes, physicians will not encourage non-drinkers to start in general, although the vast majority of physicians will admit that alcohol consumption has a well demonstrated benefit in overall longevity which has been documented for over 50 years now. Fact is that moderate (and maybe even high) alcohol consumption leads to significant decreases in cardiovascular death. Alcoholic cardiomyopathy occurs but is pretty rare, while ischemic heart disease and cardiac failure are very common. Over half the population dies from cardiovascular causes, and alcohol consumption (even in alcoholics) appears to have a benefit in coronary artery disease. Full disclosure: I am a physician and a moderate alcohol drinker. EtherDoc ( talk) 05:14, 26 December 2012 (UTC)
The above paragraph is incorrect. Heavy alcholics rarely ever have coronary atherosclerosis. They much more often die from lung disease as most of them also smoke considerably. EtherDoc ( talk) 05:14, 26 December 2012 (UTC)
Reply: Again, there is overwhelming epidemiological evidence of health BENEFIT associated with moderate alcohol consumption. Study after study has shown decreased cardiovascular disease and death. Overall longevity (all causes) is increased. Sure alcoholism is serious and associated with many medical and psychiatric problems, but the majority of alcohol consumers do not develop alcoholism. See http://www.bmj.com/highwire/filestream/376294/field_highwire_article_pdf/0/bmj.d671 EtherDoc ( talk) 20:44, 30 December 2012 (UTC)
As the article stands (27th Nov 2008), some sections focus solely on moderate consumption, with complete disregard to the effects of heavy consumption. For instance, the section "cardiovascular system" and the subsections "Cardiovascular disease"; "Coronary Heart Disease"; "Coronary Vascular Disease" ; "Peripheral Arterial Disease" ; "Intermittent claudication (IC)" ; "Heart attack and stroke", moderate consumption levels were discussed, but no mention was made of the effects of heavy consumption. Consequently, these sections are overwhelmingly positive, whereas discussion of heavy consumption would highlight deleterious effects.
This is not intended to be an article on the long-term effects of 'moderate' alcohol consumption - it is an article on long-term effects generally. The selective attention to moderate consumption biases the article.
NcLean 114.76.96.115 ( talk) 23:27, 26 November 2008 (UTC)
Strongly disagree. Agree it is important to differentiate between less common heavy consumption of alcohol, and the vast majority of alcohol consumption which is less than heavy consumption. Are there medical questions about the cardiovascular benefits of moderate alcohol consumption? No. These benefits are well documented. Are there medical questions about the deleterious effects of heavy alcohol consumption? No. These deleterious effects are well documented. Are there individuals who are confused and think that all alcohol consumption is problematic? Yes. They have shortened life spans. EtherDoc,MD (not employed by the alcohol industry) EtherDoc ( talk) 20:55, 30 December 2012 (UTC)
This is possibly the worst Wikipedia article I've ever seen, and that's pretty bad. Who wrote it, the Alcoholic Beverage Association? Study after study, reference after reference, trying to state some f***ing positive aspect of alcohol consumption. Alcohol is a f***ing poison. It is habit forming and addictive to some people. To say that there are any positive effects is a f***ing lie by the peddlers of this shit. No single substance causes as much loss of productivity, crime, and destruction as alcohol. The people who write this sh*t need to have their bottles taken away for good, you self justifying pr**ks.—Preceding unsigned comment added by 75.18.183.226 ( talk • contribs)
Your vehemence against alcohol is almost like that of a former alcoholic (who tend to be the most anti-alcohol people you'll ever meet because they think that everyone is like them and cannot handle it). You are wrong on several counts. In "moderation" alcohol does not have a huge amount of negative effects, which should be stated in the article. I agree that the negative consequences of long term heavy drinking should be cleaer though. (BTW, a lot of things that we ingest or are exposed to are "poisons" in their own right - it is the dosage and length of exposure that is important). There are a few "poisons" or "toxic substances" that can have beneficial effects in small quantities - for example Hydrogen Sulphide's potential use in heart disease. Saying that it is a "f**cking lie" to say alcohol may have some positive effects is quite frankly anti-science and NPOV in itself, as you are coming from a biased viewpoint. —Preceding unsigned comment added by GimpyFauxHippy ( talk • contribs) 12:24, 11 March 2010 (UTC)
I completely agree, most NPOV article I've seen on wikipedia. Someone should really rewrite. 99.255.5.248 ( talk) 21:33, 13 March 2009 (UTC)
I have done quite a bit of a rewrite and have removed a lot of biased and poorly sourced info, please make further suggestions of how the article can be further improved. Also please do consider registering an account and using reliable sources, eg pubmed for finding medical papers to quote to cover the impacts of heavy drinking. I was surprised at just how biased the article was when I read it in full. A lot of it was just copied and pasted, entire sections were copied and pasted quotes. Occasionally a short quote or two can be justified but a good third of this article was copied and pasted quotes, total copyright violation. I have reduced the amount of quoted text.-- Literaturegeek | T@1k? 04:12, 14 March 2009 (UTC)
Ok I just did another major rewrite and got most of the bias out or added more up to date review articles. I think that it is clear that alcohol has some benefits at low levels for the general public but the way it was written by added by David J. Hanson who's funded by Distilled Spirits Council of the United States and who used sockpuppets, was basically a propaganda piece and highly biased. I think the remaining health benefits should stay but perhaps some research of the medical literature for the adverse effects of heavy use can be added.-- Literaturegeek | T@1k? 07:14, 14 March 2009 (UTC)
Thanks for your work Literaturegeek. It certainly is an improvement. However, I would still say the article is quite NPOV. Not that any of the information is necessarily wrong (that I know of), but just the amount of space dedicated to benefits vs. risks is still very unbalanced.
As to a more specific comment, the cancer section should be clarified. One source claims alcohol is a carcinogen, one claims it is not. Also, perhaps this recent study should be included: http://professional.cancerconsultants.com/oncology_main_news.aspx?id=43299 99.255.5.248 ( talk) 10:50, 14 March 2009 (UTC)
It seems that some people are very angry about any article that doesn't describe alcohol as evil. Given the fact that certain denominations of Christianity denounce the use of alcohol, it seems that there is a natural source for bias. This is just as ridiculous as the people who try to attack the evolution article as "NPOV" or biased. —Preceding unsigned comment added by PuckSR ( talk • contribs) 03:12, 9 December 2009 (UTC)
AA and other groups do have an anti alcohol viewpoint, and I would say some of it is almost religiously inspired. In short, there's bias and exaggeration on both sides. Alcohol isn't the cure for all ills, but it isn't always as bad as others would have you believe. GimpyFauxHippy ( talk) 13:08, 11 March 2010 (UTC)
This page originated as a discussion of the controversy surrounding possible health benefits of moderate alcohol consumption. For the discussion page on earlier versions of the article, click here.
This may account in large part for the perceived imbalance of the article. It would benefit from being re-written by a subject matter expert. 147.114.226.180 ( talk) 14:34, 13 March 2009 (UTC)
Thanks that explains it. I figured out who was behind the biased edits to this article, see section above.-- Literaturegeek | T@1k? 07:16, 14 March 2009 (UTC)
I have done a number of edits over the past few weeks to the article to bring back balance to the articles. Previously there was a lot of people complaining over the years about the severe pro-bias of the article in favour of alcohol being a wonder drug. Whilst alcohol does appear to have some health benefits at low doses tese were greatly inflated and almost entirely to the exclusion of the serious health problems associated with excessive alcohol use. No doubt further improvements can be made to the article but as I don't believe that there are any serious overall issues remaining regarding neutrality I have removed the tags. If anyone disagrees feel free to point out remaining issues and if necessary readd the tags.-- Literaturegeek | T@1k? 11:16, 3 April 2009 (UTC)
No offence intended to the authors/editors of this article but i noticed a certain change in attitude about the positives and negatives of this article. In the start of this article i noticed that the authors/editors were very pesimestic towards the long term effects of eccesive consumption of alcohol but then you started to become more optimistic "Two recent studies report that the more alcohol consumed, the lower the risk of developing rheumatoid arthritis" having positive attitudes towards eccesive consumption of alcohol. Maybe there was some outside influence in this sudden change in attitude??? Ulyanov322 ( talk) 01:00, 4 May 2009 (UTC)
Thank you for your comments. Previously this article was severely biased in favour of chronic daily alcohol consumption but largely omitted the harmful effects. I removed a lot of the bias and added in the harms of alcohol. I didn't remove some of the positive effects which were cited because I was unable to find refs which disputed those claims. It seems factual that alcohol reduces rheumatoid arthritis. Alcohol however, increases the risk of gouty arthritis so that section is relatively neutral anyway. What changes do you think should be done to the article?-- Literaturegeek | T@1k? 05:59, 4 May 2009 (UTC)
There seems to be a serious lack of information in regards to the negative effects of alcohol on the brain. I have a hard time believing that alcohol is harmless to the brain and if that is the case, it's very well worth noting in fine detail [test results, medical research, etc]. Things like "atrophy", just don't cut it. What's the quantity of atrophy? What's the cause [a.k.a. the mechanism of action]? IMO, this article leaves much to be desired in this regard.
—Preceding
unsigned comment added by
76.202.194.131 (
talk)
08:38, 3 June 2009 (UTC)
Talking Alcohol is an informative and useful website highlighting the damaging effects of alcohol. The negative effects are clearly displayed and are viewable to any person(s) 18 or over. Contributions/79.121.177.78 ( talk) 09:53, 15 June 2009 (UTC)
The title should be a little more specific here. Most of the article deals with the effects of long-term alcohol abuse so that (or at very least "consumption") should be more clear from its name. I'd also remove ad hoc references to the benefits of moderate consumption for the same reason. -- mikaul talk 10:54, 30 July 2009 (UTC)
I agree, and this article badly needs more medical research evidence and less reliance on public health guidelines which are as much to do with effecting change in the public's behaviour as with the medical evidence. This is an encyclopedia not a public health agency's website [user:Byronsharp] 13 December 2009.
So, two years ago I found this article in utter disarray: apparently, it began life as something called "Moderate Drinking Controversy" as the brainchild of some very one-sided research, and with the addition of some countervailing data it had become "Alcohol and Health." I reworked it completely, deleting a bunch of useless information and trying to coral the gluttonous article into clean, cogent sections [1], and renamed it "Long-term Effects of Alcohol" to reflect its core content. Now two years later I return to find that it's been completely revamped to include solid medical data (of which I had none) with the expertise of those who understand the field (which I do not). But, awesomely, the structure I parsed still remains. Really, this is near miraculous – it's like writing a doctoral thesis by just putting some subheadings on a sheet of paper and waiting for the text to spontaneously coalesce.
Isn't Wikipedia amazing? -- Xiaphias ( talk) 19:56, 20 December 2009 (UTC)
There is a wealth of credible scientific evidence demonstrating the health benefits of moderate alcohol intake and yet this article still feels biased against the health benefits of moderate drinking. At the very least, as someone else suggested, it should be renamed to something which reflects its current purpose which is mostly to discuss the negative effects of alcohol abuse. This is a disappointment. -- 68.105.141.111 ( talk) 18:12, 19 March 2010 (UTC)
(outdent) 75.80.128.222, there are no issues of ownership; as can be seen in the conversation above I invited the editor to contribute using references to the article. Likewise you are invited to contribute to the article, using well referenced content. WP:MEDRS is the sourcing guideline that should be used for this article.-- Literaturegeek | T@1k? 15:17, 29 June 2010 (UTC)
It appears to be the opposite now. It mostly talks about the good effects of alcohol. ( 207.6.166.24 ( talk) 23:25, 2 January 2012 (UTC))
Shouldn't the effects on magnesium, potassium, etc be included as a metabolic effect?-- 192.77.126.50 ( talk) 13:20, 24 September 2010 (UTC)
I am talking about the whole article, but i will give just a few examples.
Here is from the alcohol and stroke section.
Compared to abstaining, drinking in moderation is associated with an increased risk of stroke. Light drinking offers no benefits in prevention of stroke.[50]
The reference leads as to a news article by BBC.
However, if you we go a database of scientific literature such as PubMed and check out the reviews on alcohol and stroke here is what the latest articles will be about.
"An inverse association between moderate alcohol intake and cardiovascular risk, in particular coronary disease and ischemic stroke, has been demonstrated in many epidemiologic studies"
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/19715411
"Light-to-moderate drinking is probably unrelated to increased risk of any cardiovascular condition and is related to lower risks of CAD, ischemic stroke and CAD-related heart failure. A protective alcohol-CAD hypothesis is supported by plausible biological mechanisms attributable to ethyl alcohol. "
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/19419257
"This review focuses on the most recent studies that show the association of environmental factors, nutrition, alcohol, tobacco, education, lifestyle and behavior with the risk of vascular disease, including ischemic stroke and cerebral hemorrhage. The link between air pollution and stroke risk has become evident. Low education levels and depression are established as risk factors. This is also true for heavy alcohol consumption, although moderate drinking may be protective"
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/19715411
"An extensive body of data shows concordant J-shaped associations between alcohol intake and a variety of adverse health outcomes, including coronary heart disease, diabetes, hypertension, congestive heart failure, stroke, dementia, Raynaud's phenomenon, and all-cause mortality."
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/17825708
"Epidemiological studies of middle-aged populations generally find the relationship between alcohol intake and the risk of coronary heart disease (CHD) and stroke to be either U- or J-shaped. "
"The consistency in the vascular benefit associated with moderate drinking (compared with non-drinking) observed across different studies, together with the existence of credible biological pathways, strongly suggests that at least some of this benefit is real. However, because of biases introduced by: choice of reference categories; reverse causality bias; variations in alcohol intake over time; and confounding, some of it is likely to be an artefact. "
"While regular moderate alcohol consumption during middle-age probably does reduce vascular risk, care should be taken when making general recommendations about safe levels of alcohol intake."
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/17326330
There are all independent reviews of primary source articles done by real scientists. All of the quoted articles are fresh 2006-2010.
As far as I remember this wikipedia article: some of these references were present here, but deleted.
In this case and in many other cases the expressed view in this article contradicts the scientific literature. Sure, the cause-relationship may not be proven, as it requires specific randomized trials, but, as I have allready quoted "The consistency in the vascular benefit associated with moderate drinking (compared with non-drinking) observed across different studies, together with the existence of credible biological pathways, strongly suggests that at least some of this benefit is real"
A rather neutral phrase can be found at the national stroke association web site:
"Scientists are still figuring out how alcohol use can be linked to stroke. The most important thing to remember is that a doctor is the best resource for determining how alcohol use will affect stroke risk. In some studies, drinking lots of alcohol has been negatively linked to stroke. For example, more than 2 drinks per day may increase stroke risk by 50%. Other studies have indicated that 1 alcoholic drink a day may lower a person’s risk for stroke, provided that there is no other medical reason for avoiding alcohol. Although recommendations for moderate alcohol consumption range from 1 to 2 drinks per day, the vast majority of healthcare professionals agree that drinking more than one to two drinks each day can increase stroke risk and lead to other medical problems, including heart and liver disease, and possibly brain damage"
http://www.stroke.org/site/PageServer?pagename=Alcohol
Thus the best evidence we have shows us that in terms of stroke, the risk may increase if we drink a lot and does not increase if we drink 1-2 drinks per day and may even decrease with that amount.
Compare this to this misinterpretation:
"Compared to abstaining, drinking in moderation is associated with an increased risk of stroke. Light drinking offers no benefits in prevention of stroke" - Wikipedia
We observe a better situation, yet still an absurd one here:
"Some research has claimed the all-cause mortality rates may be 16 to 28% lower among moderate drinkers (1–2 drinks per day) than among abstainers.[14][15][16][17] New York Times journalist Roni Caryn Rabin reasons that the statistics of this research are flawed.[18]"
Why is a journalists oppinion (I myself am as well a journalist) treated on equal grounds as the evidence in epidemiological studies, provided by real scientists? How about I write an aticle in press about bananas being bad for your health (for example: the benefits of bananas are exagerated by the pro-banana farmers lobby, while actually they cause cancer") and we add a link to that to the wikipedia article about bananas?
Sure some studies may be and are flawed, however, there are a lot of high-quality meta-analysis, that review the high quality studies and come to the same conclusions (which are by the way not refered to).
I will give one example:
"The selection of nondrinkers as a reference group has been questioned because this group may include ex-drinkers who stopped drinking because of health problems. A subgroup analysis restricted to studies that excluded either ex-drinkers or very light drinkers from the reference group generated a pooled curve that indeed predicted a lower (though statistically significant) protection, confirming the importance of properly selecting the reference group in studies on alcohol and health"
"In conclusion, this meta-analysis confirms the hazards of excess drinking but also indicates the existence of potential windows of alcohol intake that may confer a net beneficial effect of drinking, at least in terms of survival, both in men and in women. Heavy drinkers should be urged to cut their consumption, but people who already regularly consume low to moderate amounts of alcohol should be encouraged to continue."
"The degree of association was lower in adjusted studies, as might be expected in view of several confounding factors characterizing observational studies on drinking habits; however, the benefit of light to moderate drinking remained in a range of undoubted public health value (15%-18%). Although residual confounding cannot be excluded, it would be very unlikely to modify the scenario in a substantial manner. We found indeed that when adjusted and unadjusted data derived from the same studies were compared, the maximum protection conferred by light to moderate drinking only decreased from 19% to 16%; we can thus presume that, even in the pessimistic hypothesis that residual confounding would have the same strength in lowering the protection as that of known confounding, the "real" (maximum) protection against total mortality associated with low levels of alcohol consumption would still be higher than 10%."
http://archinte.ama-assn.org/cgi/content/full/166/22/2437
The number of deleted links to peer-reviewed reviews and articles (see old history) in this wikipedia article as well as the amount of misinterpretations of actual studies truly amazes and does not encourage editing of this article personally.
I believe this article requires serious re-editing by someone with more nerves than I have.
Scinquisitor ( talk) 15:43, 19 January 2011 (UTC)
It is something to start with, however the problem I issued is not solved.
It was said that
"to make the article more compliant with WP:MEDRS often means replacing old often primary research with newer peer reviewed secondary sources"
However, going back to strokes:
Wikipedia: "A 2003 Johns Hopkins study has linked moderate alcohol use to brain shrinkage and did not find any reduced risk of stroke among moderate drinkers"
Yet newer 2006-2010 peer-reviewed reviews I quoted above do suggest a reduced risk among light drinkers. Will there be any objections if I add something like "However several more recent reviews suggest that there is J-shaped associations between alcohol intake and the risk of stroke" with the mentioned references? I would also add a link to the Stroke association web site, saying that more than 1-2 drinks is bad and 1-2 is ok and maybe even good (according to some studies).
Also, I'm new to wikipedia editing, so I'm not sure how to deal with such things:
"Excessive alcohol consumption in Russia, particularly by men, has in recent years caused more than half of all the deaths at ages 15-54 years."
This claim appears bogus, despite being published in a respected peer-reviewed journal.
This original article "Alcohol and cause-specific mortality in Russia: a retrospective case–control study of 48 557 adult deaths" contains an interesting quote:
"These corrected percentages are similar to those shown in tables 4 and 5, and were not materially affected by finer stratification for potential confounders (AMOUNT SMOKED, year of death, years since death, marital status, relationship to informant, ethnicity, education, occupation, socioeconomic status, or recent change in socioeconomic status)"
Basically the authors "show" but do not mention that in their study smoking had no material effect on mortality. This contradicts with what Sir Richard Doll had tride to prove for such a long time. I mean "smoking kills".
The same table 4 of this article reveals to us that those who don't drink at all are at a more significant risk of death from all causes except for alcohol poisoning comparing to those drinking less than a bottle of vodka per week (even the alcohol industry does not make such claims). After this weird observation is explained with something like "some non-drinkers actually drink a lot and hide it from us" (not a quote - see text for real context) the non-drinkers are omitted from the analysis and ... well you know the rest.
This actually explains to me why the reference to this article is some kind of big abstract/ press release, not the complete Lancet study (The Lancet, Volume 373, Issue 9682, Pages 2201 - 2214, 27 June 2009).
So my question is... (if anyone can answer) can this article be used in the smoking article as proof that smoking doesn't affect mortality rates in Russia? Or maybe there is some kind of procedure that allows some kind of experts (I don't claim to be one) to evaluate if peer-reviewed articles are coherent?
Has anyone actually read the article except for me, to confirm or not confirm my findings of weirdness?
"I am not sure how far back you are going in the article history "
One or two years ago. Something like that. At that time the article contained much more credible peer-reviewed sources on most subjects and much less speculations. It was also somewhat biased (there was little criticism of the data), but atleast everything was consistent and linked to multiple independent scientific studies.
Scinquisitor ( talk) 22:46, 19 January 2011 (UTC)
Author(s): Soerjomataram I, de Vries E, Coebergh JW Source: LANCET Volume: 374 Issue: 9694 Pages: 975-975 Published: SEP 19 2009. Also something to concider. Scinquisitor ( talk) 19:58, 20 January 2011 (UTC)
Just realised that this referenced part was deleted:
"Some research has claimed the all-cause mortality rates may be 16 to 28% lower among moderate drinkers (1–2 drinks per day) than among abstainers.[14][15][16][17] New York Times journalist Roni Caryn Rabin reasons that the statistics of this research are flawed.[18]"
I only objected to the journalist article. The claim that "all-cause mortality rates may be 16 to 28% lower among moderate drinkers" is supported by more recent meta-analysis such as this one: http://archinte.ama-assn.org/cgi/content/full/166/22/2437 and relativly new research articles such as this one: "Ann Epidemiol. 2007. Volume 17, Issue 5. Alcohol Drinking and Total Mortality Risk Arthur L. Klatsky, MD, Natalia Udaltsova, PhD". The newer numbers would be "15 to 18%" protection.
I think this information should be returned to the article with these new references (as well as the old ones). Total mortality is one of the most important long-term effects of alcohol and such studies should not be disregarded. Any objections? Scinquisitor ( talk) 16:58, 20 January 2011 (UTC)
"There have been no randomised controlled trials to demonstrate the cardio benefits of alcohol"
This statement (as many other similar statements in this article concernings such trials) is true.
However, there have been no randomised trials to demonstrate many other intersting things.
For example. The evidence that smoking causes lung cancer is based on epidemiological studies not on randomised controlled trials (please correct me If i'm wrong and such studies exist).
From the article on smoking:
"Richard Doll in 1950 published research in the British Medical Journal showing a close link between smoking and lung cancer.[25] Four years later, in 1954 the British Doctors Study, a study of some 40 thousand doctors over 20 years, confirmed the suggestion, based on which the government issued advice that smoking and lung cancer rates were related.[26]"
25 and 26 are epidemiological studies (good ones).
Despite the fact, that these studies and further studies are epidemiological, nobody in the right mind would say something like: "no randomised controlled trials demonstrate that smoking causes lung cancer". Not because the statement isn't true. It is. But because epidemiological studies are regared as fair scientific evidence for causation and is the best evidence we can get. We know that smoking causes lung cancer from the observed difference in mortality between smokers and non-smokers plus some plausible biological mechanisms.
The same argument can be applied to the role of excessive alcohol consumption and (for example) breast cancer. There is epidemiological evidence. There are no randomised controlled trials to prove this. And there will never be such trials due to ethical issues. Yet, I think it's fair to warn people, that there is a link between alcohol and brest cancer.
So the current reasoning contains double standards. The current version of the article seems to invoke the "no randomised controlled trials" argument when we talk abot benefits of alcohol, but disregards this argument when we talk about ill effects, such as cancer, which are actually based on the same kind of evidence (with a few exceptions such as alhocol poisoning).
I'm new to wikipedia, so I don't know what it sais in the rules about this. So I merely express my oppinion for consideration:
To remove double standards issues and make the article more neutral, one of two policies should be chosen:
a.) Epidemiological evidence is enough to confirm potential cause of effect if biologically plausible mechanisms are provided. In this case phrases such as "There have been no randomised controlled trials to demonstrate the cardio benefits of alcohol" are true, but misleading and should not be used as an argument.
b.) Epidemiological evidence is not enough and randomised controlled trials are required to confirm cause of effect for anything. In this case we can add "There have been no randomised controlled trials to demonstrate the alcohol consumption leads to X" where X is... well X is allmost anything.
Any oppinions? Scinquisitor ( talk) 13:59, 20 January 2011 (UTC)
I'm aware that alcohol abuse causes a form of cushing's syndrome. With no knowledge on the pathophysiology behind this, I don't feel I can write about it. Can an expert on the subject offer some info? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 130.88.23.77 ( talk) 11:11, 23 January 2011 (UTC)
This is simply ridiculous. Modern science and medicine officially recognize the benefits for human health of moderate alcohol consumption. But, even with common sense and avoiding the idiotic alarmism of certain anglo-saxon "scientists", 3,000 years of Mediterranean diet should at least teach something to the World, considering the extremely low cancer rates in the so called " wine belt". It's really a SHAME that someone writes bullshits like that. Someone should denounce these charlatans. I nominate the sentence for deletion. -- Conte di Cavour ( talk) 16:17, 3 March 2011 (UTC)
"Alcohol should be regarded as a recreational drug with potentially serious adverse effects on health and it is not recommended for cardio-protection in the place of safer and proved traditional methods such as a balanced diet, exercise and pharmacotherapy." - Is this sentence written in the correct style? 85.210.182.62 ( talk) 00:21, 25 April 2011 (UTC)
Well, yes it is written as a moralistic sermon rather than as an informative neutral statement. More importantly it is incorrect. EtherDoc ( talk) 02:21, 17 January 2013 (UTC)
Regardless of whether or not moderate alcohol consumption is beneficial for adults, alcohol exposure in adolescence, particularly in a chronic intermittent binge-type pattern, has negative effects on brain development. However, there was a complete lack of information on how alcohol effects brain development on this page. I added content to address a couple possible cellular mechanisms behind alcohol's effect on the adolescent brain, which is different than its effect on the fetal or adult brain. Cekeating ( talk) 19:49, 3 December 2011 (UTC)
I provided information regarding the molecular actions of ethanol in regards to essential tremor. I then provided a link to the essential tremor page where more in depth cellular mechanisms are explained. JChanelo ( talk) 04:44, 15 December 2011 (UTC)
Hi, the german version of this article is, while still being related, on a different topic. Does anybody know how to correct that? thx— Preceding unsigned comment added by Panconojos ( talk • contribs) 17:30, 17 December 2011 (UTC)
Nowhere in the article is it specified that alcohol is used in place of ethanol, even though this article is linked to by at least one which is discussing different types of alcohol. This should be clarified in the lead or alcohol should be changed to read ethanol. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alcohol#Toxicity Testem ( talk) 16:27, 20 February 2012 (UTC)
As far as I know alcohol inhibits protein synthesis which could undo desired effects on muscular tissue from physical training
If anyone has time to write a paragraph about that this would be a nice source http://ajpendo.physiology.org/content/277/2/E268.full — Preceding unsigned comment added by Mikeschaerer ( talk • contribs) 13:59, 16 July 2012 (UTC)
Dec 31, 2012 Sminthopsis84 undid my edit commenting "Reverted the unexplained removal of medical risks such as cancer, fetal injury, etc."
My edit was valid because: Cancer and fetal injury are already in the paragraph above. Hypertension removed since alcohol in general improves hypertension. Much of the contribution seem biased. I will continue to edit this article hoping to simplfy, and present a scientific-medical perspective without bias toward or against alcohol. EtherDoc ( talk) 20:52, 1 January 2013 (UTC)
I have left your reversion essentially as is. Well I'd like to think I'm a mainstream doctor. I take care of patients (and monitor their blood pressure every five minutes) everyday, and am quite familiar with the physiology of hypertension. Sure alcoholics have increased sympathetic tone. I use this often as a way to determine which patients are alcoholics. But these are patients with fairly significant alcohol consumption. Moderate drinkers don't get hypertension from their alcohol consumption, and likely have less overall hypertension. I'll add some references. And actually many physicians (including mine and myself) although not overly encouraging alcohol consumption, are fully accepting of their patients current moderate consumption realizing its general benefits. EtherDoc ( talk) 23:03, 1 January 2013 (UTC)
As of January 2013 this article continues to have a strong anti-alcohol POV. Much of this seems to be from the addiction/psychological literature which naturally is concerned with alcohol dependence and the many problems associated with alcoholism. Talking about the well documented (and progressively better understood) benefits of moderate consumption is perhaps frightening to these groups. But Wikipedia should maintain a NPOV and simply present unbiased medical evidence, even if it contradicts the absolute anti-alcohol viewpoint of those in the addiction treatment fields. EtherDoc ( talk) 22:03, 15 January 2013 (UTC)
Concerning alcohol causing chronic fatique (not chronic fatique syndrome), fair enough. Fatique has many causes and alcohol consumption should be at least explored as part of workup. EtherDoc ( talk) 15:28, 19 January 2013 (UTC)
Why did you choose the word 'disturbing' for this talk section title? That is a very strong word and implies you are very upset and troubled about this article.-- MrADHD | T@1k? 22:44, 19 January 2013 (UTC)
Disturbing because it often seems one sided and emotional. I prefer a scientific viewpoint. There are many many problems associated with alcohol abuse as described in this article. I have not removed any of these valid concerns. But there is an implied if not explicit suggestion in some contributions that the best course is to avoid alcohol completely. The literature in no way supports this except perhaps related to pregnancy. I have seen and taken care of many alcoholics and seen children with FAS (thankfully somewhat rare in the US currently) My background is in biochemistry, medicine-almost 30 years, and brain chemistry in particular. I simply want dispassionate contributions. BTW I have tried to improve the section on cancer since there is concern for alcohol promoting certain cancers. EtherDoc ( talk) 22:46, 22 January 2013 (UTC)
Well, truth is I have already fixed many of the concerns I had. And these changes apparently have been mostly kept. The words I wrote above were partly to explain the changes I made. I feel the article is reasonable at this point although some further organizing might be needed. Section on kidney stones might be labeled renal for example. The article now has a fair amount of info on benefits and deleterious effects. :) EtherDoc ( talk) 01:18, 23 January 2013 (UTC)
Adding new New England Journal of Medicine study on significant benefit of Mediteranian diet. This is relevant since physicians randomized patients and included a RECOMMENDATION for daily wine consumption. OK, the diets were different (low fat diets are generally unhealthy) but this study is interesting precisely because subjects were instructed to drink daily. EtherDoc ( talk) 00:47, 26 February 2013 (UTC)
This is still a biased, anti-alcohol article. Most of it consists of discussion about harmful effects of excess consumption of alcohol, but any substance whatsoever, including water, is harmful if consumed in excessive quantity. This is not specific to alcohol.
Of course there are people in our culture who damage their health by ingesting too much alcohol, just as there are people in our culture who damage their health by ingesting too many hamburgers or too much sugary soda. But the long-term health benefits of drinking small to moderate amounts (corresponding to a glass of wine per day) of alcohol are clear, documented, and well-established. Unfortunately there seems to be a section of the community which holds neo-Puritan attitudes, and looks for excuses to label anything enjoyable as harmful. Driven by their bias, they are overactive contributors to Wikipedia. Sayitclearly ( talk) 07:26, 8 January 2014 (UTC)
A new study released in July 2014 used the mendelian randomization design to avoid some problems posed by observational studies. Their findings were that gene loci which are strongly associated with a propensity to consume less alcohol are also associated with lower risk of coronary heart diseases. This suggests that the effect of moderate alcohol consumption on coronary heart diseases is probably confounded by genetic differences. The study also questions the association between higher HDL and coronary heart disease. Although this study is a primary study the clever study design, the converse findings in terms of moderate alcohol consumption on cardiovascular disease and the very large sample size (> 260'000 participants) would justify to at least mention this study in the Wikipedia article about the Long term effect of alcohol. Any comments? http://www.bmj.com/content/349/bmj.g4164 Mikeschaerer ( talk) 19:57, 4 November 2014 (UTC)
OK we get it. C elegans is used in experiments of longevity. The actual gene sequence homology between worms and humans is not germane to this article. Suffice to say that C elegans is an accepted model of aging studies. Keep it concise! EtherDoc ( talk) 20:02, 9 March 2013 (UTC)
Alcohol seems to be overall beneficial starting from certain ages only, namely 35 for males and 45 for females. Before, there's a linear positive relationship between alcohol consumption and death risk. Also, gender seems to influence strongly the relationship between alcohol intake and ischaemic/emorrhagic stroke risk. http://pubs.niaaa.nih.gov/publications/arh27-1/39-51.htm http://www.bmj.com/content/325/7357/191 — Preceding unsigned comment added by 5.68.240.61 ( talk) 18:00, 9 February 2014 (UTC)