The Physical Effects of Alcohol to the Human Body
Despite the fact that some studies state that alcohol in moderation especially red wine is good for you and can lengthen your life we personally do not recommend drinking alcohol at all.
We have to be very critical and look a little closer at those research methods. The Journal of the American Medical Association published as early as 2001 that looking closer at those studies lead to the advice to reconsider the existing evidence.
It was pointed out that those studies always compared moderate drinkers with non drinkers. Due to the fact that the non-drinking control group was using mostly ex-drinkers that quit drinking for health reasons and not of people that never drank alcohol, the results are more than questionable! Of course if you compare moderate drinkers with ex-drinkers that had health issues that forced them to give up drinking the moderate drinkers will have a better mortality rate.
So let’s get to the facts
· Alcohol is a neurotoxin and can poison your brain and destroy brain cells
· Alcohol leads to serious disruption of your hormonal system
· Alcohol interferes with your digestion system and therefore weakens our Immune System(Stops the
Protein Digestion in the Stomach & Small Intestine)
· Alcohol stops your Testosterone Production (Important for Cell Rejuvenation in women and men)
· Alcohol stops the normal Function of the Liver (When Alcohol is present in the body the Liver uses
all its capacity to Detox the alcohol –> all other liver functions are on hold e.g. Alcoholics often have
fatty livers)
· Alcohol raises the Acid Level of the body and this can lead to Gastritis & Ulcers
· Alcohol leads to High Blood Pressure
· Alcohol can also lead to several different cancers (Such as bowel, mouth, liver, colon, lung, breast,
oesophageus and pancreas)
· Alcohol can causes Vitamin B Deficiency and other Vitamin & Mineral Deficiencies
· Alcohol Increases Allergic Reactions (Spanish Study 2002 with moderate alcohol consumers)
· Alcohol damages the Ability to Respond to Stress
· Alcohol harms women faster than men (Many studies done, last one in Russia May 2007 -> Brain, heart
and liver damaging effect kicks in faster in women than in men)
· Alcohol & drug use is directly associated with higher violence and violent crime
All these facts count for moderate alcohol (half a glass per day) consumption and multiply when drinking more that one glass per day!
Again taking a poison (that’s what alcohol is) in small quantities will not damage body functions right away but these toxins/poisons accumulate over time as we are talking about that little glass every day after dinner or the one or two more at a function or over the weekend going out! Higher doses of these poisons have an immediate effect, even if the person does not notice this damage to the body right away.
The International Journal of Cancer published in July 2007:
‘Just one glass of alcohol a day can lead to Bowel Cancer’
This study running over six years and included 480,000 people in the United Kingdom came to the conclusion that drinking as little as one glass of alcohol (one glass of wine or a pint of beer) a day increases the risk of developing bowel cancer by 10 %.
Also the more you drink the higher the risk of cancer. Drinking 30gr of alcohol per day (less than two pints of beer) increased the risk by 25 %.The worst results with the biggest risk in becoming different cancers and other life threatening diseases were seen when alcohol was combined with smoking.
More evidence against alcohol comes from a study linking Alcohol and Breast cancer.
This study found that postmenopausal women that drink more than a half of glass of alcohol per day and have low Vitamin B, especially Folate have a 60% higher risk to develop breast cancer than those who do not drink alcohol.
Sorry but this don’t mean that you can go on drinking and just eat more veggies and take a Vitamin B remedy to be safe! This would provide you with many health benefits but it won’t protect you against the toxic effect of alcohol. If we drink Alcohol our body breaks the alcohol down into a one of the most dangerous chemical substances named acetaldehyde. Acetaldehyde is the chemical that is also responsible to produce hangover symptoms. One major aspect is that Acetaldehyde reacts in our body with a Growth-hormone and neurotransmitter called Dopamine and can cause concentration & memory problems, anxiety, depression and other mental and emotional disturbances. The reason is easy as alcohol suppresses the Dopamine production and Dopamine is the Growth-hormone that will cause following issues if you drop under the normal Levels:
- Lack of Drive
- Lack of Energy
- Emotional Crashing
- Rigidity (hardness, stiffness, inflexibility, strictness - in relation to mental & physical)
- Suffer from Megacolon’s (XXL Stool)
- Lack of Movement in your daily life
- Lack of Joy
- Depression (No pleasure & joy)
- Increases the risk of Parkinson’s, Alzheimer’s, Bipolar, Schizophrenia and Dementia
- Underactive Thyroid function
If your Dopamine levels dropped to low for a long time so that your Thyroid was affected, then you can add following symptoms to this list:
- Weight gain around hips & upper legs
- Cold hands and feet
- Constipation
- Lethargic in the morning and enough energy at night
- Dry skin and hair
- Headaches
- Heels crack and are dry
- Lack of sex drive
- PMS - Premenstrual Syndrome
- Not able to sweat
- Swelling in eyelids, hands and ankles
- Always feeling cold and taking long to warm up.
- Skin gets a yellow tint
- Lose of outer third of the eyebrow hair
- Infertility
- Waking up exhausted even after sleeping for sufficient hours
And all this just from drinking alcohol in moderation or more!
But back to our acetaldehyde - If you want to see how toxic acetaldehyde is look it up and you will find that it has many adverse effects on many tissues and organs. All these effects play a major part in many chronic diseases and cancer.And just for you to remember, wine as well as red wine counts as alcohol! All physical benefits from drinking red wine result from the bioflavonoids found in the grape skin and seeds. So you don’t have to drink red wine as it is not the carbohydrate or alcohol in the red wine that is helpful for your health. The bioflavonoids you can get as well by eating grapes or just grape skin and drinking red grape juice as well as eating other fruits and veggies.
In a media release by the Australian Institute of Health and Welfare (AIHW) it was shown that alcohol still tops the list when it comes to the drugs for which people seek treatment.The information for this report includes over 150 000 reported treatments from 664 government funded drug treatment agencies Australia wide during 2005-2006.
As disclosed by clients in 39% of treatments, alcohol is the drug most widely used in Australia and is also the most common drug for which people seek treatment. When you add another drug to the use of alcohol, this figure increases to 54%, more than half of all treatments. The report found that many clients sought treatment for multiple drug use, with over half (53%) of treatments involving at least two drugs.
As stated in the report, over the last five reporting periods, alcohol has consistently been the most common drug as shown by the number of clients with this complaint, with the number of treatments for this drug changing very little over this period of time. The drugs chosen by clients were found to be strongly related to their age. Alcohol was found to be the most common drug of choice especially for clients aged 30 years and over, while for younger clients, cannabis was the most common drug, particularly for those aged under 20.
Another report titled ‘Alcohol Killing Our Kids’ was released by Australian Medical Association (AMA) on 20 November 2007. This report stated that the AMA is calling for stronger policies to reduce dangerous alcohol consumption, as the combination of Schoolies Week and alcohol create headlines about death and injury to young people and also reports of antisocial behaviour by drunken teenagers.
Alcohol is second only to tobacco as a preventable cause of drug related hospitalisations and death in Australia. According to the National Health and Medical Research Council (NHMRC), alcohol abuse costs Australia $15.3 billion a year through alcohol related crime and violence, loss of productivity, treatment costs and premature death.
The NHMRC also found that alcohol is responsible for 13% of all deaths among 14-17 year old Australians and estimates that one Australian teenager dies and more than 60 hospitalised each week from causes related to alcohol.
The President of the AMA, Dr Rosanna Capolingua has said:“The binge drinking culture is alive and well in Australia and urgent action is needed to re-educate young Australians about safe levels of consumption. There is a disturbing acceptance or even celebration of excess drinking in Australia. Many people view it as a national pastime to be proud of.” The report has noted that young people are placing increasing social importance on how drunk they are when they go out, drinking at home to enjoy their nights out, and young women in particular making a point of ‘keeping up’ with their male friends. The drunken public behaviour of role models and celebrities such as sporting heroes seems to be helping to glamorise binge drinking in the eyes of Australians.
People are not aware of the consequences of binge drinking and only think of the hangover the next morning, not considering the long term effects like brain damage or heart disease, let alone the danger they may put themselves in while in an intoxicated state.
A study by Alcohol Related Brain Injury Australian Services indicates that two million Australians, or one in eight adults are at risk of permanent brain damage from alcohol.
The patterns of alcohol consumption have changed to incorporate new products such as pre mixed spirits, with the proportion of teenagers drinking pre mixed spirits doubling in amount since 2001. The harmful effects of alcohol abuse which includes binge drinking, impact not only on the person themselves, but on friends and family, their workplace, the community and the health system.
There are now calls for national public awareness campaigns that clearly and also simply show the dangers of alcohol abuse, using a language that can be easily understood. The AMA have said that they are committed to achieving a reduction in the incidence of hazardous and harmful alcohol consumption, some of the measures include advertising campaigns, making excessive alcohol consumption socially unacceptable, and increased taxes on alcoholic beverages.
