It seems like it's a similar thing to sugar. The optimal amount of alcohol or sugar is not absolutely zero, a lot of foods we eat that are healthy have them, just at much lower concentrations and lower amounts.
A glass of orange juice is about the equivalent sugar of two large oranges, without any of the fiber to slow the digestion. Similarly, a beer is about the equivalent ethanol of an entire loaf of bread, without any of the fiber to slow the digestion.
The top dominant comment is the predictable "msm reported x was bad now it's good they don't know anything".
What a waste of a thread. Of course msm science reporting is trash I can get that discussion on a bad reddit thread.
Alcohol is a poison, a fairly tolerable one. It's also an addictive drug on social, biochemical, and emotional levels. And likely something that there has been coevolution with humans over the thousands of years it has been ingrained into society.
The optimal amount of alcohol is zero, because nutritionally it is completely replaceable with better options, any of the enzyme/relaxation effects are either replaced with no alcohol alternatives or far better done with exercise.
The entire thread has pro alcohol compartmentalized thinking hallmarks of addictive patterns: don't say bad things about the precious, dismiss the risks, trump up by 100x fringe studies of alleged health benefit. It's like reading /r/trees on reddit.
Now will it kill you from a single shot?no. Is alcohol one of the major millennium spanning means of getting people to procreate, a not insignificant aspect of general societal demographic health? Probably.
If you say the optimal amount of is zero, it means you pretty much can't eat any fermented food like kimchi, kombucha, etc. Obviously there's a huge difference between that and an alcoholic beverage, I would agree the optimal amount of alcoholic beverages is likely zero or very close to it.
You are somewhat correct, but fermented foods have important historical inertia due to their ability to preserve calories and nutrition. Alcoholic beverages are also like this to a lesser degree, but I personally will give a pass to such foods for their institutional importance.
Modern refrigeration is a blink in the eye of human history, after all.
Alcohol has no nutritional benefits. And there is a significant population of people who cannot metabolize alcohol. So there are definitely at least some for whom none is the optimal amount
I doubt you could hear the call of such an effect over the roar of other confounders:
Regular moderate wine consumption is a strong correlate of comfortable, non-suburban living, particularly in a post-MADD world. Generally speaking, drive less on a daily basis, walk more on a daily basis, have better cardiovascular health and less obesity, live longer. This is a significant EU/US delta.
In the US wine is not the cheapest way to get drunk, nor is it as socially popular in disadvantaged minority groups. The health issues associated with poverty & healthcare/nutrition access are less significant in wine drinkers, and the lifestyle of those statistically drawn to wine as a beverage of choice is correlated with lower stress levels.
These aren't new or novel observations, but when we're talking about very weak effects, even the uncertainty bounds on known confounders start to dominate.
A glass of orange juice is about the equivalent sugar of two large oranges, without any of the fiber to slow the digestion. Similarly, a beer is about the equivalent ethanol of an entire loaf of bread, without any of the fiber to slow the digestion.