It juices you up for a night of going out, or maybe sometimes gets you to relax in front of the zombie screen before going to bed — it's alcohol, and for decades has been at the center of the "it's bad, no it's good" debate.
Two glasses of red wine before bed? It helps your heart!
Lemon, hot water and whiskey for a sore throat or a cold? Grandma was right!
Boozy antioxidants makes women hornier than Asia Argento with a teenager? Too soon!
But the reality is — according to a new report published in the "Lancet Medical Journal" at least — not even one simple drop of social lubricant is good for you. None. Nada.
The problem is, even if drinking does have mild benefits (it does), the negative aspects of it completely negate anything positive you're doing for youself.
Oh, and that whole "it kills 2.8 million people globally each year thing" too.
“Although the health risks associated with alcohol start off being small with one drink a day, they then rise rapidly as people drink more,” Dr. Max Griswold of the Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation at the University of Washington, said in a statement. “Previous studies have found a protective effect of alcohol on some conditions, but we found that the combined health risks associated with alcohol increase with any amount of alcohol.”
How things got so twisted about its benefits is likely due to exactly what you're thinking right now: Big Booze often paid for "studies" to drive a narrative it wanted to sell more alcohol. In the interests of profit, companies lied to you. *gasp*
This isn't to say put the drink down and never look back, but as consumers of a commodity, it's of course your right to know both the benefits and dangers of a product before making a decision to imbibe responsibly (or not, whatever).
Because after all, alcohol has been a part of human civilization since our first monkey ancestor took an overripe plum to the dome and started in on Journey's "Can't Stop Believin'" in front of his ex-girlfriend. And it's played a crucial role in how we function as a society, even if it's killed a few hundred million along the way. (And we're sure the manufacturer of Sharpie markers haven't much minded either.)
But as Lavar Burton once probably said but we're not entirely sure now if he did or not because memory problems: The More You Know.
Cheers.
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