Before you go and make Christmas more miserable than it need be, it is worth taking the following into consideration.
A committee that was set up to determine safe drinking levels published a report that stated the safe drinking level for men was 28 units of alcohol per week (roughly three bottles of wine) and for women it was 21 units (roughly two).
A member of the committee, Richard Smith, the former editor of the British Medical Journal, later said that they couldn’t actually find any scientific evidence to justify these limits but thought they ought to publish something as that was what they had been tasked with so they just “plucked the figure out of the air”.
Some time later, the safe drinking levels per week were reduced to 21 units for men and 14 units for women. Now the safe limits are 14 units per week regardless of whether someone is male or female.
Perhaps this has been done in the name of equality or to make it easier for men to switch genders and become women without worrying about the reduced alcohol limit.
The most charitable explanation for this absurdly low level is that the nanny state knows we are all going to exceed the recommended level regardless of where it’s set so they set it low to keep alcohol consumption down. Their intention was to make us feel so guilty we become abstemious instead of rampant alcoholics.
The trouble is, they may be doing more harm than good and over the last two years our health experts haven’t exactly covered themselves in glory. Professor Sir Richard Doll was the epidemiologist that first found a causal link between cigarette smoking and lung cancer. He was so convinced that he immediately stopped smoking. He was meticulous and through his integrity and lifelong insistence on the highest standards, Doll won the respect of colleagues and scientists throughout the world.
In 1994, a study of 12,321 middle-aged, male doctors led by Sir Richard Doll and a team at the Radcliffe Infirmary – “Mortality in relation to the consumption of alcohol” – found that: “The consumption of alcohol appeared to reduce the risk of ischaemic heart disease, largely irrespective of amount.” Other studies have since been published which showed that moderate amounts of alcohol gave some degree of protection against heart disease.
“But what about cancer, liver disease and all those other ailments alcohol consumption causes?” I hear you cry.
Earlier this year the BBC broadcast a programme showing the post mortem of an overweight American woman who had died in her sixties. As her organs were removed it was shown how each was affected by certain factors and how, if she had still been alive, this would have gone on to cause her demise.
Lastly they removed her heart and saw she had heart disease which was what had killed her. She was teetotal. Perhaps if she had been more inclined to have one or two glasses of wine a day she may have lived longer.
So if you do have a particularly indulgent Christmas and New Year perhaps a few alcohol free days wouldn’t go a miss, but whatever you do don’t ruin the whole of January.
To join in with the discussion please make a donation to The Daily Sceptic.
Profanity and abuse will be removed and may lead to a permanent ban.
“Perhaps this has been done in the name of equality or to make it easier for men to switch genders and become women without worrying about the reduced alcohol limit.”
Don’t give them ideas. They’ll be increasing the safe limited for women so more men change “genders”.
If anyone needs someone to talk to we meet every Sunday.
Stand in the Park Sundays 10.30am to 11.30am From 1st January 2023
Make friends & keep sane
Elms Field (near Everyman Cinema and play area)
Wokingham RG40 2FE
I’m going to do Dry January next month – I’ll just stick to dry white wine, dry cider, dry sherry…
LOL
Happy Christmas! I’ve got some cask strength whisky in stock; it’s fairly dry – only about 43% water in it
Good man 🙂
👍 👍 👍
Top man!
Reminds me of that old joke – “Dean Martin drinks Canada Dry”!
What we now call “binge drinking” used to be called just “drinking”!
Exactly. Binge drinking is going out too late.
The other feature is that those who promoted the modified guidelines failed to declare their interests. Well, I’m an active member of the Campaign for Real Ale (CAMRA) – not that I’m commercially involved in the trade. That said, the published recommendations have long since varied from country to country.
There’s quite a bit of (real) scientific evidence in support of your last but one para on the topic of the use of ethanol as a blood thinner, although it’s not all that popular with those that know this. It’s a question of balance, overall. Perhaps they should recommend a shot of whisky after having a jab of something or other!
All of this nonsense, been going on for years, comes about as a consequence of spineless ministers not standing up to their gormless civil servants; too much government, too large a public sector, inadequate leadership:
‘During World War II, [Nobel laureate, Ken] Arrow was assigned to a team of statisticians to produce long-range weather forecasts. After a time, Arrow and his team determined that their forecasts were not much better than pulling predictions out of a hat. They wrote their superiors, asking to be relieved of the duty. They received the following reply, and I quote “The Commanding General is well aware that the forecasts are no good. However, he needs them for planning purposes.”
Don Cresswell
No doubt their attitude was “something must be done”, to avoid appearing to be gormless. Now, where have noticed that in the last few years?
As a one-time member of CAMRA, I knew this as it had been discovered as part of their efforts to counter the building anti-alcohol (fun) league. Unfortunately CAMRA has lost its way these days (got too focused on a real ale) and is dying out as the membership ages.
Which is a real shame because the hospitality industry has been thrown under the bus and kicked so many times whilst it was down over the last few years, that I’m amazed that anyone wants to get up in a morning to run a pub.
The consumer and hospitality industry really needs an organisation to fight their corner. Won’t be CAMRA but maybe something will arise from the ashes.
I’ll stick with the traditional definition of an alcoholic, as being someone who drinks more than their doctor.
Logically, there are two kinds of preconditions for any kind of event different from them: Some A can be a necessary precondition for B, ie, B will only occur after A occured first. Or A can be a sufficient precondition for B, ie, B will always occure after A has occurred. And that’s it. Smoking, to use the less popular example, is neither a necessary nor a sufficient precondition for any kind of disease (Nor is consumption of alcoholic drinks[*], for that
matter).
[*] Not alcohol, for Pete’s sake, nobody consumes alcohol. That would first lead to unconsciousness and then death very quickly. The whole notion of alcohol consumption is based on teetotaller fantasies who claim there can be no other reason for drinking, say, a beer, except as a step on the way to become intoxicated (a state that’s generally not particularly entertaining).
My GP told me that I should stop drinking cider. I asked why. He replied “because I’m trying to examine you!”
Apologies but I’ve started early today.
Man goes to the doctors and says: “Doctor, I cant stop my hands from shaking!”
Doctor replies “Do you drink much?”
Man says “no, I spill most of it!”
Seasons Greetings to you.
Fourteen units a week? Firkin hell that’s a quiet Friday night.
As a former marine engineer and marine technologist I recall times when consumption of beera and spirits was simply obligatory. After the Herald of Free Enterprise capsize that year, the press focussed on a soggy case of beer in the bosun’s cabin after the vessel was salvaged to imply a causal link with ‘consumption in the workplace’ ignoring the fact that the ship was the crew’s home when on board. Shipping companies fell over themselves to implement restrictions. In 1991 I was overseas early November on a UK managed Liquid Gas tanker. Relaxing in the bar the Chief steward, Captain and Chief engineer chatted about the 28 unit limits – the Chief steward produced the bar book record to show that everyone, every week stuck religiously to the 28 units. I went through the columns and could not find fault. Surely they had invented a few extra officers to account for the excess consumption? The 3 of them laughed and told me to check the date on the current page; it was marked April the following year. Apparently head office checks had completely failed to spot this. Wishing all a moderate Christmas !
I’ve always thought so many things are/were worked out on the back of a fag packet – 14 units of alcohol, 5 (or is it 10?) fruits and veg a day, 2 metres for (anti) social distancing. I really detest that this need is felt to tell us what to do all the time. Just leave me alone to live my life as I see fit.
Happy Christmas one and all.
Two large G&Ts followed by a couple of large glasses of wine with my evening meal (red or white depending on the cuisine) and still going strong. Mind you there’s cycling, golf, dog walking (twice a day) and gardening added into the mix! Virtue signalling? Moi!!!
It is just the same with the 5-a-day. Most health advice seems to be made up with no evidence to support it.
14 units = 6 pints of normal strength beer, so as long as professional darts players are still hitting bullseyes I’m inclined to call that limit ”lightweight”.