Last weekend, one of the lovely women in this community sent me a New York Times article called Even a Little Alcohol Can Harm Your Health.
Overall, I’m a big fan of this subject going mainstream. HUGE fan. It should have happened 15 years ago.
If more major publications publish the truth about the health consequences of drinking, then more people will quit alcohol for health reasons and it won’t be so weird for people to not drink.
Just that title makes me cheer out loud…
The subtitle is good too: Recent research makes it clear that any amount of drinking can be detrimental. Here’s why you may want to cut down on your consumption beyond Dry January.
(OK, the research isn’t “recent” but publications need their headlines to look cutting edge.)
I’ve been studying how alcohol causes cancer for years and I love the direct and simple explanation the author provides about how alcohol damages your DNA, which harms the cells, which then causes them to mutate and when mutated cells replicate, we get cancer.
The piece also shines a light on how the rumor that alcohol is heart-protective is complete BS.
Truly, I’m excited this is out in the world from the New York Times. I heard it was on the cover but I didn’t see it so I can’t confirm if that’s true.
There’s one thing that pisses me off though…
The author won’t say that we shouldn’t drink at all.
There’s actually a ridiculous part where she quotes a doctor as saying “So people who are drinking five or six drinks a day, if they can cut back to three or four, they’re going to do themselves a lot of good.”
No – three or four drinks a day is not “a lot of good.”
After 1,323 words about how alcohol is terrible for your health, we get this???
There are a couple of things going on here that always happen with articles about how alcohol is bad for you:
- They quote doctors (and not research). Most doctors don’t take unhealthy alcohol use seriously. This is exasperating. There are ways to approach this that work, are cost-effective and save lives; but no one is getting that from the medical community. When it comes to alcohol, doctors are under-trained, under-supported and underfunded. As a result, they don’t know how to address unhealthy alcohol use in any meaningful way.
- Americans don’t want to be told what to do, dammit! God save any researcher, scientist, writer or publication who tries to explain why we can’t have something that we want. Even worse, put the burden on individuals to change their diet or exercise practices and you’re going to be attacked, shunned and potentially out of business faster than you can get your green smoothie out of your blender.
As excited as I am about the social progress I read in this article, I’m bummed that we haven’t yet shaken off the issues that are confusing to the public and ultimately harming people.
Confused people don’t change anything, they just keep on doing what they’ve always done because that’s all they know.
If you haven’t read the article, read it here.
