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DrugScreening.org


 
Alcohol Beneficial for People with Certain Genetic Make-Up
February 23, 2001

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Research Summary

Researchers have determined that moderate drinking is beneficial for people with a particular genetic make-up, CNN reported Feb. 21.

In a study on genetics, alcohol and heart disease, researchers at Harvard University found that drinking is good for people with a variation in the alcohol dehydrogenase type 3 (ADH3) gene because they metabolize alcohol more slowly than others.

Researchers determined that if these people drink one or two alcoholic drinks a day, they are 82 percent less likely to have a heart attack than a person without the variation gene who drinks the same amount of alcohol.

Dr. Meir Stampfer, one of the study's co-authors and chairman of the department of epidemiology at the Harvard School of Public Health, explained that when alcohol is metabolized more slowly, it has more time in the body to have good effects.

"Some people have claimed that moderate drinkers are the same ones who jog, and maybe it's the jogging that protects against heart disease," Stampfer said. "But since this genetic variation is distributed evenly without regard to anyone's lifestyle, the fact that we see an impact on the risk of heart disease tells us it's the alcohol."

The study's findings, said Dr. Robert Eckel, chairman of the American Heart Association's nutrition committee, "is a very important message and one that takes us into the 21st century. If this observation is confirmed, I can see a scenario where a physician does genetic testing and says 'Mrs. Jones, you have this genetic variation and you don't drink much. Maybe we ought to increase your consumption."

The study is published in the New England Journal of Medicine.

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