Drink?: The New Science of Alcohol and Your Health

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Whilst I take a break from alcohol I wanted to read something dispassionate and informative. Drink?: The New Science of Alcohol and Your Health is exactly what I was looking for. Professor David J. Nutt provides the science combined with a very non-judgemental tone. It's information that everyone should be given early in life to allow rational and informed decision making. Alcohol is a subject that should receive more attention in our culture. As David Nutt states, if you want to drink less here in the UK it's as if you've decided to stop gambling yet have to live in a Las Vegas hotel. I realize this has turned into more of a critique than a book review. You may just want to read the first three and last three of the following paragraphs if you want the short version of my review. Alcohol affects more than 200 different diseases. Alcohol is one of the top five causes of disability and disease in Europe. In the UK alcohol is a leading cause of death of men between 16-54. Insightful & informative. A non booze-industry-bashing view on alcohol and its place amongst all drug categories. Written by the UK governments former chief adviser/drug tzar. The one that got fired! He will illuminate our minds on what 'responsible drinking' truly means and equip us with the knowledge we need to make rational, informed decisions about our consumption now and in the future.

Drink?: The New Science of Alcohol and Your Health

After listening to Edward Slingerland’s audiobook, Drunk, and reviewing that a couple weeks ago, I was curious to learn more about the latest research on alcohol and health. David Nutt is on a mission to explain the most significant alcohol-related research findings from the last 50 years. What I enjoyed most about his pragmatic approach is that he explains the impact of ANY amount of alcohol consumption. This is about making informed decisions, not moral judgements. He clarifies the differences that various levels of alcohol consumption have on our mental health, sleep, hormones, fertility, and propensity toward addiction. Binge drinking, or getting "wasted" is very bad for you, much better to limit how much you do this. Many of us know the feeling of wanting a drink after a stressful day at work or enjoying a Friday evening pint at the pub. Drinking is a part of numerous celebrations, sporting events and bank holidays across the UK and the world. Yet, the 9 billion pounds spent by the UK’s National Health Services and police force on alcohol-related incidents per year are barely discussed. Drink? invites you to question not only the normalcy of these actions in our lives, but how, personally and through policy, we can reduce the harm caused by drinking. Parts of this was laughable. Long chapters about different ways to talk about alcohol use, just very clumsy kitchen psychology and mundane.However, the evidence is pretty damning, even though alcohol is associated with blue zone diets and minor improvements in cardiovascular health drinking any amount of alcohol has more negative effects than positive. I am particularly amused by the effects alcohol has on our sex hormones. Drinking appears to be something that in our society is part of the “lad culture”. Yet alcohol has been shown to reduce levels of testosterone whilst increasing levels of oestrogen. So much so that if you drink enough, a man can become feminised, developing male breasts, losing muscle mass and facial hair, and seeing reductions in sperm count. Alcohol makes a man less of a man, not more. The irony!

Drink?: The New Science of Alcohol and Health - Harvard Book

This was very British. And felt extremely careful. Like the writer had in mind his audience of football hooligans. Maybe that was true.For me, reading Drink?: The New Science of Alcohol and Your Health has been a wake up call. It's a book most drinkers should probably read. Nutt's good on the health issues of alcohol, including more details on cancer than I had known before. Alcohol bad. Drink none is perfect. Drink less is good. Drink more is probably bad. Drink a lot is definitely really bad. That’s basically the book.

Drink? The New Science of Alcohol and Your Health

Provide a nonjudgmental willingness to assist the reader in minimizing harm if they decide to drink once informed. Read the introduction; it contains some of the 'truths' about alcohol. "Marketing has altered our perception," "...its's absurd that coming of age should still be about alcohol," and "Would you take a new drug if you were told it would increase your risk of cancer, dementia, heart disease, or that it would shorten your life?" A good way to drink consciously is to count your drinks and plan them for the week. If you know you will be drinking 2 nights in a given week, and then plan to have no more than 4 drinks on each of those nights, you are more likely to not exceed/overdrink.Drinking while driving is a huge cause of death. In the US we have a .08% limit, which is actually not even that safe. Many countries in Europe have .05%, and many in Scandinavia have .02% (basically sober). Two days in a row of drinking is extremely bad for you as your body doesn't have time to recover and you don't sleep well, it's a downward spiral. Avoid this if at all possible, and go light the second day if you decide to drink. This book certainly exceeded my expectations. The overall pedigree and experience of Dr. Nutt put him in an excellent position to author this book, and he did a laudable job balancing it with a sufficiently rigorous scientific/health-related dive, the effects at the personal versus the societal level, economic considerations, as well as the many benefits of alcohol that people tend to overlook. The author also concludes with a seemingly sensible plan for those who take the facts seriously, both personally and at the institutional/policy level. The book is not a meant to scare people into worry about their habits, but rather provide a sober (hah) analysis of the risks at hand.

Drink?: The New Science of Alcohol and Your Health - Goodreads

All in all, we shouldn't drink. Or at least try drink as little as we can. And shouldn't wash the food down with glasses of alcohol.More expensive booze is probably not better for your body. It often contains congeners which are in effect different types of alcohol and they can (probably) worsen the hangover. But just how bad is alcohol? Well Nutt dives into the brain and bodily science to describe it's implications in over 200 diseases. Nutt evens names alcohol as the most damaging drug to society. Also, we only actually like the taste of alcohol and coffee because while being bitter, they're also addictive and pleasurable to the brain. So we find "taste" in otherwise bitter drinks. A world-renowned authority on the science of alcohol exposes its influence on our health, mood, sleep, emotions, and productivity -- and what we can and should do to moderate our intake. Never mix drinking with drugs. You are less likely to know what you're taking when you're drunk, and you don't know how it will mix.