Moderate Alcohol Drinking Helps Women Stay Slim

By Margarita Nahapetyan

Women under the age of 50 years who consume light to moderate amounts of alcohol, especially red wine, are more likely to stay slim, when compared to their counterparts who do not drink alcohol at all, report scientists from the United States.

The experts from Brigham & Women's Hospital in Boston, led by Dr. Lu Wang caution that drinking alcohol on a regular basis is associated with harmful effects, but weight gain among light drinkers may not be one of them. For the study purposes about 19,220 women in the United States took part in the survey, all of them with the ages from 39 years or older and with a body mass index (BMI) in the range considered as normal (between 18.5 and 25). The women were asked to recall how many alcoholic drinks they typically consumed on a daily basis in the previous year and also were asked to report their weights.

According to the data collected: about 38 per cent of women reported that they abstained from alcohol; 33 per cent said that they consumed less than 5 grams of alcohol a day (a standard drink has approximately ten grams of alcohol); 20 per cent said they drank between 5 and 15 grams of alcohol a day; 6 per cent reported drinking between 15 and 30 grams, and 3 per cent drank 30 or more grams of alcohol a day, which is about 2 to 3 drinks or more.

The results revealed that during the average of about 13 years of follow up, the women were likely to gain weight. However, the most weight was gained among the abstainers, with weight gain decreasing with increasing amount of alcoholic beverages consumed. A total of 7,942 (about 41.3 per cent) of the women who had a normal weight at the start of the study, became overweight with a body mass index of 25 or more, including 732 women (3.8 per cent) who became obese with a body mass index or 30 or higher.

The study also found that women younger than 50 years of age who consumed low to moderate amounts of alcohol, between 15 and 30 grams a day, had almost 0.7 times the risk of becoming overweight or obese, when compared to their counterparts of the same age who abstained from alcohol drinking. Women who did not drink alcohol gained an average of 8 pounds (3.63 kg), compared with 3.4 pounds (1.55 kg) for those who drank 30 grams or more of alcohol on a daily basis.

Previous research on the health benefits of alcohol have found some mixed evidence. Some studies came to the conclusion that males and, to a lesser extent, females who consumed alcohol in moderation over the long-term periods, showed a lower risk for developing heart-related conditions. But another study found that even moderate drinking might increase a woman's chances of developing breast, liver and other types of cancers.

Dr. Wang and colleagues say that more research is required in order to investigate the role of alcohol consumption and metabolism in both women and men, and to identify how behavioral, physiological and genetic factors may influence the effects of alcohol.

The study is published in the March 8 edition of the journal Archives of Internal Medicine.