Medical Headlines of the Day
"A drink or two releases feel-good endorphins." Glug, glug. (OK, another one to be on the safe side: Glug.) Now what's the rest of it say? Dr. Christina Gianoulakis of McGill (Canada! We might have known): "Drinking low amounts of alcohol is associated with mild euphoria, decreased anxiety and a general feeling of well being, while drinking high amounts of alcohol is associated with sedative, hypnotic effects and often with increased anxiety." Hypnotic? Anxiety? And what was the other one, we dozed off -- sedative? We'll take our drinking advice from Dr. Katherine Tucker of Tufts: "Moderate drinking may help build bone density," she says. "Beer is an excellent source of silicon, a mineral needed for bone health that has become increasingly rare in the modern diet." She doesn't give us a hard time about having one too many!
Here's another: "Healthy diet, exercise ward off deep belly fat." So that's why we've got this gut! Nothin' to do with the ol' grain and grape at all. We'll just get our drunk ass up on that treadmill -- wait a minute: "Smokers generally had more visceral fat than non-smokers... besides the effects of diet, exercise and smoking, high alcohol intake was related to greater visceral fat in men, though not women." Jesus, it's always something -- we bet a chick wrote this, too. "Esther A. Molenaar of the University Medical Center Utrecht." Pfft, figures. Also: "Smoking encourages deep-fat accumulation because it reduces the action of estrogen and boosts the production of male hormones." Well, at least the smokes are making us manly, just like the ads said they world. Butch up, fellas, with ciggies and drink! It's a short life but a merry one.
Email to Friend
Write to Editor
Print Article
