wine and health

The paper today featured a full-page ad exhorting us to drink responsibly over the Labor Day weekend, good advice to be sure. The main point was an emphasis on the equivalency of different forms of drinking in terms of the total amount of alcohol: One 12-oz beer = one cocktail = one 5-oz glass of wine. Perhaps the thinking is that people lose track of the true amount they are consuming with lower-alcohol beverages. Just a couple of beers or a few glasses of wine, not like hitting the hard liquor, right? The tagline was “It’s not just what you drink, it’s how much.” Useful information I suppose but perhaps an oversimplification when it comes to wine, as we have seen so many times before. My advice here would be to look at the question of not just how much you drink, but how you drink. Beer may be consumed with meals but is marketed as a “party” drink, or refreshment while watching TV or sporting events. Historically (and I mean a very long time ago) it was considered to be a sort of ...