Alcohol: Friend or Foe?

More money I spent every year promoting the use of alcohol than on any other product on the market. The alcohol industry generates more than $65 billion annually and spends more than $1 billion on advertising. Advertising campaigns target our children, hoping to gain product loyalty by turning these children into future annuities. Alcohol use is so widespread that it is seen as a suitable drink with which to celebrate any occasion. Many find it difficult to communicate without partial to total intoxication. The goal of alcohol advertising is to portray alcohol as hip, youthful, fun, sporty, harmless and necessary. This industry is not concerned about health; it wants lifelong addicts who will constantly contribute to its revenues.

Generations of definitive research condemning alcohol are now met with bogus studies released for public knowledge. The high percentage of the population who drink on a regular basis prefers to accept industry created data, while there are 100 truthful studies against alcohol for every one concocted by the industry’s paid puppets. Ask any addiction specialist id alcohol is less harmful than such hard drugs as cocaine, heroin, methamphetamine, etc. In fact, those doctors held in the highest regard consider alcohol the most psychoactive drug on earth. Competent researchers can cite a plethora of studies showing that the interaction of alcohol with the body completely correlates with the predictable outcome of psychological addiction. Unchecked, the majority of alcohol consumers can easily slip into alcoholism, the most common self-inflicted disease suffered today.

Good scientists consider alcohol to be a septic poison that weakens every cell and organ in the anatomy. It is absorbed directly through the walls of the intestine without digestion and travels through the bloodstream, where it extracts water from the cells, dehydrating the body. Of course this weakens the cells, usually killing them. This process causes severe damage to vital organs, including the liver and brain.

The liver cleans the blood thousands of times each day. When that blood is saturated with deadly alcohol, the liver converts that alcohol into sugar. When metabolizing excess quantities of alcohol, the liver begins to swell and may become filled with fat. Eventually, the liver begins to weaken, and fatty liver degeneration begins, developing scar tissue on the liver, which leads to cirrhosis. Even small amounts of alcohol consumption begin to threaten the liver’s integrity. At this point, blood is no longer capable of passing through the liver properly. Cirrhosis is characterized by the hardening of the liver because of the unnatural development if connective tissue leading to further decline of healthy and active liver cells.

After repeated consumption of alcohol, the liver’s enzyme production is inhibited. This impedes the absorption of fats, proteins, and most vitamins (vitamins A, B, D, E and K). After this devastation, the body struggles to effectively burn stored fat. Alcohol’s caloric content is 70 calories per ounce and it silences the body’s natural craving for food and generally renders the habitual consumer malnourished. Additionally, alcohol causes blood sugar levels to drop, creating fatigue and causing energy levels to diminish. This deadly drug also acts as a cocarcinogen that enhances the carcinogenic effects of other chemicals by promoting tumor formation.

The liver is a remarkable organ capable of regenerating itself after being severely damaged. But because alcohol is one of the toxins that the liver cannot process very well, the liver is unable to repair itself after such damage.

Once the liver is damaged, other organs of the body suffer, especially the brain. The amount of oxygen supplied to the brain is reduced, directly damaging the brain cells. Common manifestations of such damage are amnesia, disorientation, hallucinations, emotional disturbances and, in severe cases, seizures and neurological disorders. Short-term effects of alcohol consumption include difficulty walking, blurred vision, slurred speech, slowed reactions times and impaired memory.

The list of negative health effects of alcohol is very extensive compared to the few so-called positive effects of alcohol, which can be achieved by other nutritional methods.

For example, the topic of drinking red wine has many believing that the antioxidant effects of the resveratrol and flavanoids found in the grape skins and seeds prevent blood clotting and plaque formation in the arteries. Wouldn’t it seem better for your health to consume the actual skins and seeds to get the benefits from these antioxidants instead of risking your health by consuming red wine?

Another concern about consuming wine is the addition of sulfites to the wines to prevent oxidation and spoilage. These sulfites may induce allergic reactions in some people, causing breathing problems, hives, heartburn and headaches. Many people try to justify the use of drinking wine by claiming that the wines they are consuming are organic, stating that no sulfites have been added. This claim leads people to believe that they are not causing any harm to their health by consuming these legal drugs. These consumers may not realize that organic wines are allowed to contain a small percentage of sulfites without having to state it on the bottle.

There are actual reports stating that the wine industry developed a marketing campaign to boost the perception of wine as a health food. This campaign is misleading the public about drinking, according to a report issued by the Center for Science in the Public Interest (CSPI).

“Disguised as objective information based on recent research,” said CSPI Alcohol Policies Project Director George Hacker, “the Institute’s propaganda spreads the deceptive and potentially dangerous message that moderate drinking- especially moderate wine consumption- is an important factor in maintaining all-around good health for the general public.

This report states that the Wine Institute manipulates research to highlight reasons to drink but fails to report the evidence of the damaging effect of alcohol consumption.

“There is no health magic in wine,” said Sheila B. Blume, M.D., addiction psychiatrist and former New York State Commissioner on Alcoholism. “I would never recommend that anyone begin drinking, because alcohol has many destructive health effects.”

There is no greater deterrent to human sanity, family structure and productivity than the use of alcohol. Growing up, I experienced firsthand the destructive results of alcohol on my family. After many years of habitual drinking, my parents’ marriage began to crumble, and neither one could take the emotional and verbal abuse that invaded their lives after abusing this drug. After 18 years of marriage they divorced, and my sisters and I became part of a broken family. As the youngest, I watched my to older sisters follow the same vicious cycle,, justifying their behavior but knowing in their hearts the damage it was causing to their physical and emotional health.

Many drinkers will use slogans like, “I only drink socially” or “I only consume beer or wine,” without realizing that alcohol is alcohol and in any form it has a social and personal negative impact. As an example, each bottle of beer contains approximately the same alcohol content as a shot of whiskey. Most wines, volume to volume, have higher amounts of alcohol than beer. Then there are those who go directly to the hard stuff and claim to drink only one small shot a day. Ask the billions of alcoholics who consume only small amounts, but need it daily, if the amount makes any difference in their dependency.

Don’t be fooled by ad campaigns that direct you to participate in what should be an illicit practice. The direct, negative effects from the consumption of alcohol outweigh any perceived positive benefits they can state. Most of the so-called benefits of alcohol are easily achieved by adapting a lifestyle of pure foods, exercise and positive attitude. It is the negative mind with low self-esteem that is fertile ground for cultivating the disease of alcoholism. Staying active and well-nourished is a significant retardant against the degenerative act of drug consumption.

Vol 26 Issue 4 Page 34