Reducing alcohol to half a unit a day saves lives

Reducing alcohol to half a unit a day saves lives

Expert say that by reducing alcohol intake to half a unit a day, about 4,600 lives in England could be saved a year. Melanie Nichols, lead author of the paper, said: "Over 4,000 deaths from cancer, heart disease, stroke and liver disease in England could be prevented if drinkers reduced their average level of alcohol consumption to half a unit per person per day - a level much lower than current UK government recommendations. The Oxford University has done the research, they looked at weekly drinking patterns of 15,000 adults in England. According to the government men should not drink more than three – 4 units a day and women two or three.

Henry Ashworth said: "Drastically cutting everyone's consumption to half a unit a day (ie one large glass of wine a week) is not the way to reduce harms in the smaller groups who are misusing alcohol and need specific and targeted help".
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/health-18262608

My Opinion

I’m not so much a drinker myself and it really bothers me that some of my friends are. I am diagnosed diabetes (type 1 MODY, this means it is genetic) so for me it was highly recommended not to drink too much. I think this should count for everyone. There are so many diseases linked to alcohol consumption that I think this needs a lot of attention. I don’t think making alcohol more expensive would solve this, I think everybody has to know the consequences from alcohol consumption.