The New Complete Book of Food
patients, convalescents, and people who do not have ulcers or other chronic gastric problems
that might be exacerbated by the alcohol.
Dilation of blood vessels. Alcohol dilates the capillaries (the tiny blood vessels just under the
skin), and moderate amounts of alcoholic beverages produce a pleasant flush that temporar-
ily warms the drinker. But drinking is not an effective way to warm up in cold weather since
the warm blood that flows up to the capillaries will cool down on the surface of your skin
and make you even colder when it circulates back into the center of your body. Then an alco-
hol flush will make you perspire, so that you lose more heat. Excessive amounts of beverage
alcohol may depress the mechanism that regulates body temperature.Adverse Effects Associated with This Food
Increased risk of breast cancer. In 2008, scientists at the National Cancer Institute released
data from a seven-year survey of more than 100,000 postmenopausal women showing that
even moderate drinking (one to two drinks a day) may increase by 32 percent a woman’s
risk of developing estrogen-receptor positive (ER+) and progesterone-receptor positive (PR+)
breast cancer, tumors whose growth is stimulated by hormones. No such link was found
between consuming alcohol and the risk of developing ER-/PR- tumors (not fueled by hor-
mones). The finding applies to all types of alcohol: beer, wine, and spirits.
Increased risk of oral cancer (cancer of the mouth and throat). Numerous studies confirm the
American Cancer Society’s warning that men and women who consume more than two
drinks a day are at higher risk of oral cancer than are nondrinkers or people who drink less.
Note: The Dietary Guidelines for Americans describes one drink as 12 ounces of beer, five ounces
of wine, or 1.5 ounces of distilled spirits.
Increased risk of cancer of the colon and rectum. In the mid-1990s, studies at the University
of Oklahoma suggested that men who drink more than five beers a day are at increased risk
of rectal cancer. Later studies suggested that men and women who are heavy beer or spirits
drinkers (but not those who are heavy wine drinkers) have a higher risk of colorectal cancers.
Further studies are required to confirm these findings.
Fetal alcohol syndrome. Fetal alcohol syndrome is a specific pattern of birth defects—low
birth weight, heart defects, facial malformations, and mental retardation—first recognized
in a study of babies born to alcoholic women who consumed more than six drinks a day
while pregnant. Subsequent research has found a consistent pattern of milder defects in
babies born to women who consume three to four drinks a day or five drinks on any one
occasion while pregnant. To date, there is no evidence of a consistent pattern of birth defects
in babies born to women who consume less than one drink a day while pregnant, but two
studies at Columbia University have suggested that as few as two drinks a week while preg-
nant may raise a woman’s risk of miscarriage. (“One drink” means 12 ounces of beer, five
ounces of wine, or 1.25 ounces of distilled spirits.)
Alcoholism. Alcoholism is an addiction disease, the inability to control one’s alcohol
consumption. It is a potentially life-threatening condition, with a higher risk of death by