The jury is still out on the medicinal powers of red wine, but the most recent scientific data gives a thumbs up to drinking it down
"(Wine) sloweth age, it strengtheneth youth, it helpeth digestion, it abandoneth melancholie, it relisheth the heart, it lighteneth the mind, it quickeneth the spirits, it keepeth and preserveth the head from whirling, the eyes from dazzling, the tongue from lisping, the mouth from snaffling, the teeth from chattering and the throat from rattling; it keepeth the stomach from warbling, the heart from swelling, the hands from shivering, the sinews from shrinking, the veins from crumbling, the bones from aching, and the marrow from soaking." — Josph Lyons, copied from a 16 th century manuscript.
"Drink a glass of wine after your soup and you steal a rouble from the doctor." — Russian proverb.
They may have used leeches, bled out evil humours by slicing into arteries, and drilled holes into one another’s skulls to let the demons out, but it seems that medieval and renaissance doctors knew a thing or two about wine.
Ten years ago, the CBS newsmagazine 60 Minutes did a 10-minute spot on the medicinal benefits of red wine. It seems that Europeans, who tend to have at least one glass of wine with dinner, every single night from the age of 10, had far healthier tickers than their fried chicken and beer bingeing American cousins.
Studies showed that red wine, consumed in moderation, could lower your cholesterol, clean your blood, ease stress, and reduce your chances of having a heart attack.
People know a good bandwagon when they see one and jumped on with aplomb. For the past decade red and white wine sales increased dramatically in the U.S., Canada and around the world. Vineyards popped up all over the map, and the wine racks at your local liquor store got a lot more international as demand exceeded the supply.
Wine consumption doubled in the last decade, with more than 20 per cent of North Americans choosing to pull corks rather than twist caps. The average consumer drinks five gallons of wine a year, or roughly 150 glasses – one-tenth (!) of what French, Italian, German and Spanish wine drinkers typically consume.
Between 1997 and 1998, wine consumption in the U.S. only increased by one per cent, yet the size of the market grew by almost 6 per cent. This is because people are moving away from basic white wines, jug wines and screw-caps to the more expensive varietals. The market is worth more than $20 billion in North America, with an annual growth rate in the 1990s of between 5 and 10 per cent for different segments within the market. Red wines are up, California wines are up, imports from Europe and South America are up.
It’s impossible to pin the growth of the wine industry on any one factor, whether it’s the general prosperity of the last decade, the growing sophistication of consumers, a result of wine education and marketing, a trend, a generational phenomena or the product of health awareness – it’s likely a combination of all these factors.
A recent study by the American Journal of Cardiology confirmed that moderate drinking helps protect against heart disease, but also found that white wine and beer were equally as effective as red wine. The same study found that red wine was a better antioxidant, inhibiting the build up of fatty plaques in coronary arteries, but the same substances can be found in beer and white wine in lower concentrations.
The study further suggested that quantity may have as much impact on arterial health – "Drinking patterns could play a role" in the effect of alcohol on the heart, wrote researchers. "Spree drinking may attenuate alcohol’s protective effect against CAD (Coronary Artery Disease). Ingestion of alcohol slowly, with food‚ (more usual with wine and possibly beer) may have more benefit."
That theory got a bit of boost last week (April 18) with two new studies in the Journal of the American Medical Association. U.S. researchers found that moderate drinking – not light drinking – appears to be linked to a reduced risk of heart failure and an improved survival rate following a heart attack. The first study, conducted by Dr. Kenneth Mukamal of Bth Israel Deaconess Medical Centre in Boston, Massachusetts, tracked 1,913 people is 45 U.S. Hospitals after they had suffered attacks. People who drank lightly, between one and seven drinks a week – including wine, beer and spirits – were 21 per cent less likely to die as a result. People who drank moderately, between seven and 14 drinks a week, had a 32 per cent lower risk of dying.
In the second study, cardiologists at Emory University in Atlanta, Georgia, followed 2,000 people with an average age of 74 in 1996 from 1982 to 1996, prime time for heart disease and heart attacks. While none of the participants showed any sign of heart disease when the 14-year study began, by the time the study wrapped up, 281 people had experienced some form of heart failure – in 28 cases it was fatal.
The participants who consumed moderate amounts of alcohol, about two litres a month, had a 47 per cent less chance of experiencing heart failure. Moreover, those who abstained from alcohol completely had the highest incidence of heart failure.
In an earlier 1997 study of close to half a million American men, more than three drinks a day increased the health risk, bringing about the concept of the happy medium. When you plot the statistics on a graph, you get a "U" or a "J" shape, with the bottom of the "U" or "J" indicating the lowest risk of heart disease and moderate consumption and the sides indicating higher risk due to lower or higher intake – in the scientific community this is known as the "U" or "J" shaped curve.
While these studies are hardly grounds to disband the AA or appoint Michael Moriarty as our new Minister of Health, they are just two more studies on a growing pile that indicates that moderate drinking is good for you. It isn’t medicine, and nothing is a substitute for healthy eating and regular exercise, but in a society where the majority of people slouch at a desk all day and on a couch all night, a couple of beers or glasses of wine could actually be a good precautionary action – that’s if you even want to live a long life.
While red wine may not be the ultimate heart helper it was made out to be, scientists and the medical community are constantly discovering new health benefits.
Last summer, scientists from Ohio discovered a compound in red wine that can treat persistent cold sores – less popularly known as the herpes simplex virus. Like most viruses, herpes simplex mutates and changes over time, gradually becoming resistant to the current treatments. The red wine compound, which is currently the proprietary secret of a large pharmaceutical company, attacks the virus at the earliest stages of its development. The virus isn’t developed enough to provide any resistance, and dies right there on your lip.
Most recently, experts from across Europe have studied red wine as the cure, treatment or preventative medicine for a wide range of ills. Experts from a wide range of scientific and medical disciplines met at the University Victor Segalen in Bordeaux, France last week, one of the most famous wine producing regions on the planet, to discuss their findings.
The first hint that red wine may actually do more than provoke singalongs, redden teeth and result in brain-splitting hangovers, came for this region – the French Paradox. Historically, the French people, particularly from the south, had lower rates of cancer and heart disease than almost any other civilized population on the planet, despite the fact their diet is often loaded with fat.
While nobody is sure how this paradox works, scientists believe it has something to do the polyphenols in wine that gives it its red colour. There are more than 200 different polyphenols in a bottle of red, and at least some of them have medicinal properties that we can only guess at.
Some may relax blood vessels, reducing blood pressure. Some are clearly antioxidants, mopping up damaging intermediate chemicals – sometimes referred to as free radicals – that we absorb and accumulate in our everyday lives. Vitamins C and E do the same thing, but less effectively – vitamin supplements have little effect when used alone.
There are also studies that red wine can alleviate three major arterial problems – high cholesterol, cell proliferation ad blood clotting.
The scientists are meeting in Bordeaux to discuss these polyphenol compounds in wine, and to investigate their possible uses as treatment for AIDS, sleeping sicknesses, heart disease, cancer, blood ailments and skin conditions. It is the first symposium of its kind on blood and wine.
While it could take decades to study all the polyphenols on their own and in compounds with all of the other polyphenols in red wine, we can be sure of one thing without even knowing all the how’s and why’s – it definitely doesn’t hurt your health to drink red wine in moderate quantities, and there’s a better than good chance that it helps.
According to WineAnorak.com, people who drink moderate amounts of red wine and other alcoholic beverages have a lesser chance of developing inflammation and ulceration as a result of Helicobacter pylori, an organism that many of us carry in our stomachs.
People who drink a glass of wine with dinner are less likely to contract Type II "late onset" diabetes, or to suffer an Ischaemic stroke.
Women who consume alcohol have higher spiral bone densities than women who don’t, suggesting that red wine might benefit women’s health in the post-menopausal period.
Men who consumed moderate alcohol had a reduced risk of contracting benign prostatic hypertrophy, a swelling of the prostate that can make it difficult to pass urine and could result in a blockage of the urethra.
So, "cheers."
