A new federal study found no protective health effect from alcohol at any consumption level and reported that men drinking 14 alcoholic beverages per week face about a 1-in-25 lifetime risk of alcohol-caused death.
By yourNEWS Media Newsroom
A new federal study is challenging the long-standing belief that moderate alcohol consumption, including a daily glass of wine, can provide health benefits.
The research, published in the Journal of Studies on Alcohol and Drugs and led by Kevin Shield of the University of Toronto and Katherine Keyes of Columbia University, found no protective health effect from alcohol at any level of consumption.
According to the study, men who drink 14 alcoholic beverages per week face roughly a 1-in-25 lifetime risk of dying from an alcohol-related illness or injury. That level of consumption had previously been the upper limit in U.S. dietary guidelines.
The study also found that women face more than twice the liver disease death risk of men at 14 drinks per week. Researchers recommended that U.S. guidelines cap alcohol consumption at one drink per day for all adults.
The findings run counter to decades of public messaging suggesting that light or moderate drinking, particularly red wine, may support health.
Researchers said earlier studies claiming health benefits from moderate drinking were distorted by the way they compared drinkers with abstainers. Many studies grouped lifelong nondrinkers together with former heavy drinkers who had stopped consuming alcohol after developing health problems.
Those former drinkers were more likely to have other risk factors, including smoking, depression, unemployment, poor physical condition and lower education levels. That made moderate drinkers appear healthier by comparison, even if alcohol itself was not protective.
The new study addressed that problem by comparing drinkers with people who had never consumed alcohol. Once that adjustment was made, the apparent protective effect disappeared.
The study also examined alcohol’s broader health risks. Alcohol is linked to more than 200 health conditions by ICD-10 codes, including cancer, liver disease, injuries and other illnesses.
Researchers reported that 178,000 alcohol-attributable deaths occurred annually in 2020 and 2021. Among working-age adults, alcohol accounted for 12.9% of all deaths.
Despite those risks, public awareness remains limited. A 2025 survey found that only 56% of American adults knew alcohol causes cancer.
The study’s authors said the knowledge gap makes public education and warning labels an urgent priority.
Alcohol’s effects also extend to hormone health. A 2023 study published in Alcohol and Alcoholism by University of Copenhagen researchers found that chronic alcohol consumption suppresses Leydig cell function in the testes, reducing testosterone production by as much as 25% in men drinking more than 14 drinks per week compared with nondrinkers.
Researchers said alcohol increases the conversion of testosterone to estrogen through the enzyme aromatase, creating hormonal changes associated with muscle loss, increased fat storage, reduced libido and depression.
The study found that even moderate drinking, defined as seven to 14 drinks per week, was associated with statistically significant testosterone suppression.
Alcohol consumption remains widespread in the United States. As of 2024, 134.3 million Americans age 12 and older reported drinking within the past month, representing 46.6% of the population. Of those, 57.9 million adults reported binge drinking, defined as five or more drinks within two hours for men or four or more for women.
The risk modeling in the new study used 2022 American death records, Census Bureau population data and disease burden statistics from the Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation.
For men, the threshold for a 1-in-1,000 lifetime alcohol-related death risk began above 6.5 drinks per week. For women, it began just above seven drinks per week.
At more than 8.5 drinks per week for both sexes, the lifetime death risk exceeded 1 in 100. At 14 drinks per week for men, the risk reached 1 in 25.
Women faced higher risks for liver disease at comparable consumption levels. At 14 drinks per week, women were more than twice as likely as men to die from cirrhosis and other chronic liver diseases. At 21 drinks per week, women’s liver disease risk was triple that of men.
Researchers noted that women metabolize alcohol differently because they generally have lower levels of alcohol dehydrogenase, an enzyme that helps break down alcohol. As a result, women can reach higher blood alcohol concentrations from the same amount of alcohol.
Binge drinking sharply increased risks of fatal injury. Each 0.02% rise in blood alcohol concentration, roughly equivalent to one additional drink, increased the odds of a fatal car crash by 74%.
At the legal driving limit, fatal crash odds were 13 times higher than for sober drivers. At 8.5 drinks over three hours, crash odds were 52 times higher.
The study also found that any detectable level of alcohol was associated with nearly seven times the odds of a suicide attempt compared with not drinking.
The researchers concluded that the previous two-drink-per-day standard for men was based on inadequate data. They recommended a uniform one-drink-per-day cap for adults, regardless of sex.
The findings add to growing evidence that alcohol should not be treated as a health food or wellness habit. Researchers said the science now points to measurable risk even at levels commonly described as moderate.
Source: Natural News
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