"One bottle of wine per week is equivalent to five cigarettes for men, or 10 for women"

enfant terrible · 18-12-2021 9:29pm #1

As an alcohol drinker, reading the study below about the links between cancer and alcohol, was quite shocking. I always knew alcohol was bad for me but considered cigarettes in a different league as regards cancer.

https://bmcpublichealth.biomedcentral.com/articles/10.1186/s12889-019-6576-9

In this country we have quite rightly stigmatize cigarette smokers, "cancer sticks" etc but we appear to be living in a dreamland as regards alcohol links with cancer, I was anyway.

Does the government need to start putting the above stats, pictures of liver damage etc. on the cover of alcohol bottles like we did with cigarettes or would that be too unpopular a move considering our relationship with alcohol?

buried · 18-12-2021 10:02pm

Who would have thought that back in 1994 when Oasis released "Live Forever" it would have such a profound and utterly ridiculous effect on everybody, because it seems everybody since then has taken this songs lyrics way way way way too f**king seriously

Wibbs · 18-12-2021 11:31pm

So doc, if I give up good food, fine wines, cigars and wonderful women of delectable virtue, will I live longer?

Nope, but it'll bloody well feel like it.

I feel this is almost an extension of the "old farts" thread hereabouts. Did you give a feck at 20 or 30 about all this stuff? No. Or you sure as hell shouldn't have. To do so would be the very definition of joyless dry shíteism. Being healthy is one thing and very commendable, but who really wants to be a 95 year old, likely going a bit daft, boring the young with tales of your past they've no interest in as they nod "yes dear" while giving you a sponge bath, with a mickey that's now just a pipe for peeing, which you may well be doing into a nappy, while eking out one's days playing bridge. Badly. With other oulfellas and oulwans wittering on about their hip replacements and pasts you're not interested in. Or worse start to become interested in. A mumbled relic of regret to yourself waiting for a machine that goes beep to stop beeping. Personally I'd prefer to tap out a la John Entwistle(bassist with the Who for the younger or more ignorant readers), massive coronary in bed with a stripper with a neat pile of Columbia's best marching powder on the bedside table. Now granted his heart gave out at 57, but reverse those numbers and sign me up.

circadian · 18-12-2021 11:34pm

Who the **** smokes wine?

DarkJager21 · 18-12-2021 11:38pm

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118344864#Comment_118344864

UB40 kiiiiddd, yup red red wine yurt

y0ssar1an22 · 18-12-2021 11:40pm

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/2058223458/one-bottle-of-wine-per-week-is-equivalent-to-five-cigarettes-for-men-or-10-for-women

provide everyone with the data, let them make a decision.

i'd say processed foods, or foods with highly saturated fats and sodium leads to more deaths than smoking and drinking combined but no ones really cares about that.

Wibbs · 18-12-2021 11:41pm

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118344864#Comment_118344864

A true Frenchman.

Mech1 · 18-12-2021 11:44pm

Ok I'm beat so 40 cigs and 10 cans a day, every day for the past few years. Smoking and drinking since I was 17, I'm 55 now and happy and reasonably healthy.

Wish me luck.

Wibbs · 18-12-2021 11:47pm

Never mind that the result dug out was a 1% increase in risk. That's tiny and way beyond reality and could easily be explained by statistical noise. I smell a bias in the researchers. Another similar study I read used East Asian people for much of their data set. A population with a load of people within it that don't have the same genetic addons that allow europeans to metabolise alcohol. That would be like a study into the effects of dairy products using folks from India(a huge number of which are lactose intolerant for historical and cultural reasons).

phonypony · 18-12-2021 11:49pm

Alcohol is great, there's no two ways about it.

But there has to be better education about using it to deal with the BS in life, it's too easy a trap to fall into. We need to learn to remove the situations, issues and people from our lives that cause us drink mindlessly.

As a people I think we're too passive aggressive, dealing with nasty people and problems by knocking back a bottle of wine or 6 cans when we really need to take control and tell the âsshóles to fúck right off.

Wibbs · 18-12-2021 11:51pm

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118344902#Comment_118344902

OK that isn't exactly lifestyles of the long lived and healthy, but fair play Mech.

Lookit, pick damned near any bloody food, or drink, or lifestyle choice you make and some "study" by some muppet somewhere will tell you it's going to kill you. Until next week, when another muppet and their "study" will tell you it's good for you, or not as bad as we thought. Everything in moderation, death brings its own excuse.

phonypony · 18-12-2021 11:52pm

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118344902#Comment_118344902

Reasonably healthy, except for your floppy antenna!

enfant terrible · 19-12-2021 12:14am

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118344935#Comment_118344935

I think because smoking just looks so obvious and actually unhealthy we rightly sneer at smokers but they're may be an inconvenient truth that alcohol is a major cancer causer too.

That's why I'm wondering would the public find it acceptable for the government to target alcohol the way they did cigarettes giving our special relationship with alcohol, even if people knew the truth do they want to hear it.

Deregos. · 19-12-2021 10:19am

I think Dennis leary said it best . . . https://youtu.be/GHIT2or-F9o

maestroamado · 19-12-2021 10:24am

I'm a TOM WAITS fan...

Brid Hegarty · 19-12-2021 10:30am

@Wibbs So doc, if I give up good food, fine wines, cigars and wonderful women of delectable virtue, will I live longer?

Who said anything about giving up women? You can have rock without drugs you can have women without alcohol.

Ger Roe · 19-12-2021 10:38am

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118344936#Comment_118344936

His floppy antenna has given many hours of pleasure to people all over the world. 😉

Wibbs · 19-12-2021 10:58am

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118345701#Comment_118345701

I would say it depends entirely on the woman(or man) involved. As for rock without drugs; I would reference a friend of mine who once opined that drugs should be like condiments to food, a little dab can highten flavour, but if you're swallowing the contents of a salt cellar you're doing it wrong. I would include alcohol in that.

AckwelFoley · 19-12-2021 12:38pm

Im 44. Im in good health, I got married 10 years ago, had 3 kids born in thw last 8 years. I've become accutely aware that life is not a never ending story, life is finite

I gave up cigarettes 3 years ago because its utterly clear that they will shorten your life. I've seen first hand the terrible existence people suffering and recovering from the prolonged use of them

Alcohol, I love, perhaps too much, never drank more than the weekend but, I found I became more dependent on alcohol in order to enjoy myself, so I've pressed the reset button, I haven't touched a trunk since the may bank holiday, there wasn't a single reason it was a personal decision, i want to learn to enjoy myself without a pint before I go back on it. I've need pretty successful at doing that, and frankly I don't miss the seedy head and recovery from a "good night"

Maybe it's age, maybe it's a midlife crisis, or maybe it's having children that depend on me but I wil try length my life best I can. I enjoy what I have

If you require cigarettes, alcohol or any other substance to enjoy yourself I believe you're doing it wrong, certainly they can enhance the experience, but it's horses for courses. I'll no doubt have a drink in the future, but it will be on my terms

growleaves · 19-12-2021 2:33pm

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118344853#Comment_118344853

Well we've made life-extension the overriding priority of our society since March last year and you were a defender of that yourself. Apparently most people *do* want longevity at the expense of quality of life, and this is more important to them anything else.

Brid Hegarty · 19-12-2021 3:14pm

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118344902#Comment_118344902

Do you depose of you cigarette butts properly? That would be a lot o cellulose acetate in the environment.

Brid Hegarty · 19-12-2021 3:16pm

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118344853#Comment_118344853

Well you're forgetting one thing. By extending the length of one's life they are also extending the length of their active life

AllForIt · 19-12-2021 3:37pm

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118346636#Comment_118346636

The reason I don't drink regularly now is not because of a threat of cancer but because I don't want to be overweight because being overweight does not lend itself to be being active and I enjoy being active. Personally I pile on the pounds when I drink in no time at all which is not just caused by the calorific alcohol but also due to hangovers which make you feel lethargic and as well induces food cravings the following day. I many very well die of cancer anyway sure but at least I'll be much more active so happy to do without.

cnocbui · 19-12-2021 3:50pm

Scientists have been struggling - and boy, Oh boy have they tried really hard - to find an equal party pooper for coffee. So far, no luck, but I'm sure given a bit more funding, one of them will come up with coffee consumption being equivalent to ingesting X quantity of plutonium.

kiffer · 19-12-2021 4:40pm

Balance of risks.

Drinking a bottle of wine a week is a deleterious as 5to10 cigarettes a week? Does that mean two bottles is the same as 10to15, or 20? Not necessarily. It doesn't need to be a linear thing.

So let's just say, for the sake of argument that one bottle of wine a week is 7 cigarettes a week. One a day.

I don't know anyone who smokes one cigarette a day. Hardly anyone moderates their smoking like that.

Smoke on the way to work, smoke at 11am coffee break, smoke at lunch, smoke at 3pm slump, smoke on way home... 5 right there. Smokers in work used to nip out for a lot of phone calls during the day... So I'm going just say 5 to 10 cigarettes a day.

On the other hand I know lots of people who drink one bottle of wine a week, in a glass a night sort of pattern.

Drinking heavily and smoking heavily are both very damaging.

Drinking causes damage to you, and then your drunken behaviour causes damage to others.

Smoking damages you, but your behaviour is largely fine, except the smoke hurts people around you, physically through second hand smoke, which is fine if you're nipping outside to do it so no-one is sitting in a cloud of smoke. God I miss the smoke... That thick haze over the dancefloor like a smoke machine, just... **** everything sucks now.

Anyway, people can smoke 40 a day, (cash permitting) and still do their job, but they can't drink four to eight bottles of wine a day and still do their job. Which is why when I started in the work force after school it was perfectly fine for someone to say "and you have unlimited smoke breaks" ... Nicotine is a stimulant, and cigarettes were cheaper than now, they actively benefitted from people stepping out for a cigarette every half hour.

Rant starting to boil into more nonsense so I'm going back to lurking.

kiffer · 19-12-2021 4:57pm

Actually looking at the paper,

"""If 1000 men and 1000 women each drank one bottle of wine per week, we estimate around ten men and 14 women would develop cancer as a result."""

ok. That's fairly clear so.

Drinking a bottle of wine (ten units) a week is a 1% life time chance of getting cancer... No more wine for me. I'll stick to rum.

kiffer · 19-12-2021 5:07pm

Reading on, they go onto say that three bottles for men, goes from 1% to 1.9%... let's call it two. Which basically means thrice the wine, but only twice the risk. That third bottle is basically a freebie. ... For men.

For women three bottles is 3.6% so... What's not as good, but yeah.

They(the mythical they) say that between 1 in 4 and 1 in 6 people get some sort of cancer in their life time.

Call it 1 in 5 people, get some sort of cancer, not necessarily die of it. That's 20%

I think the idea that 1-5% of drinkers get a cancer that they wouldn't have gotten if they didn't drink alcohol is believable.

Cutting the drinking out completely knocks a few percentage points off your risk. But maybe that glass of wine a day is keeping you relaxed and preventing you dying of something else.

It's a rich tapestry.

I'm more worried about sugar and diabetes, and my teeth. I have a much harder time cutting sugar than booze.

19-12-2021 5:14pm

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118344853#Comment_118344853

Not all true. Drove past a 92 year old driving fenceposts with a two handed sledge. He is more use to the young ladies than the current bunch of woke young men with all their anxieties and complexes. And he has massive road frontage too