Many cancers avoidable with less drinking: study

[Keith Bee]

Source: CBC.ca

Drinking too much alcohol is blamed for a "considerable proportion" of cancer cases, a large new European study suggests.

The study in this week's issue of the medical journal BMJ said current or former alcohol consumption could be blamed for as much as 10 per cent of cancer cases in men and three per cent in women.

The conclusions were based on following more than 100,000 men and 250,000 women aged 37 to 70 in Britain, France, Italy, Spain, Greece, Germany, the Netherlands and Denmark from 1992 to 2005.

"A considerable proportion of the most common and most lethal cancers is attributable to former and current alcohol consumption," wrote lead author Manuela Bergmann of the Institute of Human Nutrition Potsdam-Rehbruecke in Nuthetal, Germany.

Read more: http://www.cbc.ca/news/health/story/2011/04/08/alcohol-cancer-deaths-europe.html

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Hey, this is from a Canadian website, therefore I simply do not trust it: Those hockey-lovin' bastards are just trying to scare us into cutting down so they'll have more beer to drink! :beer:

[kestrel91316]

1. I'm sipping a glass of white zin as I read this. But it's my first wine in

probably 2 months, or 3.

[kentauros]

43. I don't drink wine, but I'm the same way with beer, ale, and some liquors.

A six-pack of good-quality beer will last me a month! :D

[SpartanDem]

2. I'll take my chances

some things are just too good give up. :toast: :beer:

[nyy1998]

4. 10% doesn't exactly scare me either

:dilemma: :beer:

[Arrowhead2k1]

3. I can't stand these "studies".

They don't talk about anything to try to help me understand how alcohol is carcinogenic, so how can we even be sure? It might not even be the alcohol itself that led to an increase in cancer rates for those certain people. There are lifestyle issues that go along with drinkers too. People who drink excessively also tend to smoke or be exposed to smoke more, and possibly even other drugs( Heck, we don't even know what kind of pills people are popping for their hangovers). They also tend to be less nurished and have lower immune system responses, which can lead to catching more bugs/viruses during their lives. Viruses have been known to cause cancer. Also, dehydration could be a factor here too. There are many other factors here as one can imagine. It's hard to come to any solid conclusion based on any observed correlation.

[iemitsu]

9. alcohol is a toxin.

it should not be hard to figure out how it might harm you. if you consume too much in a short amount of time it kills you outright.

[Arrowhead2k1]

11. Toxin =/= Carcinogen.

Yes, it will certainly kill you if you have too much of it in your blood stream, but you do NOT die from cancer. You die from respiratory failure caused by central nervous depression. A completely different ball game than what this "study" has concluded.

[Confusious]

28. Everything is a toxin if you consume enough in a short amount of time

The only difference is, how much?

You could die if you drink to much water. OMG!!

[Thor_MN]

32. Too much water will kill you, too much oxygen will kill you

Are you claiming that water and oxygen are toxic as well?

[Fearless]

14. This may help...

http://alcoholism.about.com/cs/cancer/a/aa000520.htm

[Arrowhead2k1]

26. There is "evidence", but nothing conclusive.

There is no actual explanation as to why chemical ethanol would cause cancer in humans. Clinical trials on rats exposed to alcohol failed to produce tumors in the past. With humans in their uncontrolled environments, there are too many other contributing factors to be jumping to any concrete conclusions specifically about the chemical we find in alcoholic beverages themselves.

[Psephos]

27. The same can be accurately said about AGW/ACC.

I find the evidence convincing in both cases, despite it not being conclusive.

In both cases, we posit models, and then refine them by harvesting their predictions about real-world effects. By comparing observed results with model predictions, we learn how the models need to be refined. Over time, they become quite good.

In complex multivariate systems (whether climatological or biological), no single agent can usually be fingered as a definitive cause of system-wide effects, but through statistical methods we can derive probabilities of causation that can be quite useful, indeed.

[daleo]

25. I am sure they used statistical controls for a lot of these co-factors

The obvious ones like smoking, at any rate. But it's hard to control for everything, without a randomized control trial, which wouldn't be practical here.

[trud]

30. smoking

I read an article today about the Japan situation, and it quoted a woman as worrying about the minuscule increase in radiation in her area, while she sat there smoking.

[daleo]

41. People worry about risks that they didn't volunteer for

More than those that they took on voluntarily. That's quite a robust finding in risk analysis.

Thus the seeming anomaly of smokers being worried about air pollution, for example.

[Spider Jerusalem]

36. ...

An increasing body of evidence now implicates acetaldehyde as a major underlying factor for the carcinogenicity of alcoholic beverages and especially for oesophageal and oral cancer. Acetaldehyde associated with alcohol consumption is regarded as 'carcinogenic to humans' (IARC Group 1), with sufficient evidence available for the oesophagus, head and neck as sites of carcinogenicity. At present, research into the mechanistic aspects of acetaldehyde-related oral cancer has been focused on salivary acetaldehyde that is formed either from ethanol metabolism in the epithelia or from microbial oxidation of ethanol by the oral microflora. This study was conducted to evaluate the role of the acetaldehyde that is found as a component of alcoholic beverages as an additional factor in the aetiology of oral cancer.

http://www.jeccr.com/content/30/1/3

See also many many research articles in medical journals here: http://scholar.google.co.uk/scholar?hl=en&q=ethanol+carcinogen&btnG=Search&as_sdt=0%2C5&as_ylo=&as_vis=0

[inwiththenew]

5. Well, you gotta die from something

:toast:

[JenniferJuniper]

6. I haven't studied the study but

more often than not there are other lifestyle issues associated with alcohol consumption that raise the risk of cancer. Smokers, for instance, are more much more likely to drink and drink more heavily than non-smokers. So unless they carefully screened out other contributing factors, I'd take it with several grains of salt. Around the rim of the margarita glass.

[JustABozoOnThisBus]

7. I gotta take this with a grain of salt

followed by a shot of tequila.

[CoffeeCat]

8. What about red wine???

The particulars of this study are vague. Is drinking a glass of red wine a few times per week as bad as getting
loaded on Coors Light every night?

[cui bono]

12. I didn't think anything was as bad as Coors Light.

ba-dum-bum

[CoffeeCat]

15. It is...

...pretty bad isn't it?

Mad Dog 20/20 is a close contender, for bottom-of-the-barrel drinking, tho. :D

[customerserviceguy]

21. Well, there's Bud Light and Miller Light

Sipping on a Northwest microbrew as I type this out in the vicinity of the Portland airport. Tomorrow's plane will have three suitcases loaded with NW beer and wine.

You might live longer if you don't drink, or it might just seem like it.

[Nevernose]

35. That Simpson episode?

Where Homer visits the Duff brewery, and the Duff Ice, Duff Dry, and Duff Light go in separate containers but all come from the same original pipe?

(It's a shame I can't post a picture to DU from my phone)

[Fearless]

13. Loaded? Yes that's far worse over time than a glass of wine.

[Mojorabbit]

17. other studies show drinking a bit of wine is

good for your heart so it is half dozen of one and half of the other. Life is short. I say enjoy all things in moderation. We are exposed to increasing levels of pollution and toxins in the environment, something will get you eventually. :)

[boppers]

18. I drink beer.

Hence, no Coors Light.

[Incitatus]

10. ut oh

[Lugnut]

16. Meh.

I'm having a few beers tonight. I'll take my chances.

[Liberty Belle]

19. I'll drink to that.

[AtheistCrusader]

20. Hell yeah, I'm gonna live forever!

[cliffordu]

22. Sheeit - I'm almost 60. At this point I'm playing on house money, so line em up.....

[Exultant Democracy]

23. That was good for a chuckle.

[Le Taz Hot]

34. LOL!!!

I'll be joining you in 4 years and as bad as they're screwing over everyone, especially Boomers, I'd just as soon be plastered for the event.

[daleo]

24. I think the positive effects on the circulatory system would outweigh this.

Everything has pluses and minuses.

[trud]

29. heart arrhythmias

Alcohol is a known promoter of heart arrhythmias. There's tons of anecdotal evidence in a heart rhythm support group I'm in. I myself can't touch it without going into afib. (And I have no history of even normal social drinking, let alone alcoholism.)

[Uben]

31. Alcohol kills like cigarettes?

Let's tax the fucking shit out of it! Yeah, that's it! Okay all you anti-smokers, put down your damned wine glasses and start paying a 100% tax on alcohol. All alcohol needs to be taxed heavily to deter people from buying it, just like we did with cigarettes. A bottle of wine should not cost less than $100 and a six pack of brewskis should also be around a $100 each. Think of all the damned revenue we could generate by taxing those fucking alcohol drinkers! It's the only fair thing to do since congress feels like taxation is the best deterrent to cancer-causing vices.

[Thor_MN]

33. Been a bit since your last nicotine fix?

Tell us how you really feel.

[FLPanhandle]

38. LOL. Nice one.

[WatsonT]

45. Alcohol is taxed

pretty heavily.

Of course me enjoying a beer doesn't in any way increase the odds of getting cancer for the guy next to me drinking water.

So it's not a perfect comparison to cigarettes.

Chewing tobacco would be a better analogy.

[FLPanhandle]

37. I'm not going through my life skipping pleasures because I'm afraid of cancer.

After some boating today, I'll be grilling steaks and sipping red wine. I'm enjoying my life, not living scared.

[bitchkitty]

39. Drinking alcohol is not unhealthy.

But getting drunk is very unhealthy, and it makes one stink.

[JackRiddler]

40. nooooooooooooo!!!!!!

[quakerboy]

42. Its not just alcohol. Water causes cancer too

I can prove it. Stop drinking or consuming anything with water in it. You have my personal guarantee you will not die of cancer, backed with whatever stakes you desire.

[WatsonT]

44. But how would that help us on the dance floor?