Red Can Be Good For You
Much has been made of the health benefits of red wine and the good news for those of us who like to unwind with a glass or two is that the red stuff really does seem to be the smart person’s drink of choice...
So what exactly are the benefits of drinking red wine? And how much should we be drinking?
According to several scientific studies, the key to red wine’s health-giving properties lies in the polyphenols – chemical compounds – found within the wine skin. These are thought to act as powerful antioxidants, protecting the body from disease.
In particular, red wine is lauded for its high levels of resveratrol, an anti-oxidant thought to be between 20 and 50 times as effective as vitamin C.
Scientists believe that resveratrol can have an anti-blood clotting effect, helping to prevent the forming of clots in the blood vessels.
These clots, or thrombi, are a major cause of heart attacks and strokes, making red wine, rich as it is in resveratrol, a heart-healthy tipple.
Not only that but red-wine drinking has also been found to have a positive effect in preventing certain cancers and slowing the progress of degenerative brain diseases such as Alzheimer’s and Parkinson’s.
Should you need any further persuasion to pour yourself a glass, consider the fact that heart disease and cancer rates have been shown to be considerably lower in red wine drinking populations than in those where red wine is never, or rarely drunk.
This is found to be the case even in communities where fatty meats and cheeses are regularly consumed (often referred to as the French Paradox – the French tend to eat rich food, drink lots of wine, yet have low levels of heart disease).
Like any alcoholic drink, red wine when drunk in excess can have a negative effect on the body. Alcohol itself is thought to have no nutritional value and when consumed in more than small quantities is indeed toxic.
Whilst one glass of red wine may be as good for the heart as a helping of green vegetables, nobody would advise replacing your five a day portions of fruit and vegetables with five glasses of red wine a day.
Most of us occasionally drink more than what the experts tell us is ‘good for us’, any positive effects of red wine consumption are lost if you’re regularly bingeing on the stuff.
Many health experts advise that men should drink no more than two glasses of red wine a day and women no more than one, but in truth there is not an exact one size fits all approach to how much wine is good for each individual.
Factors such as age, weight and gender all play a part.
What the experts do agree on, is that to enjoy the health benefits of red wine, it is best to spread your units out over the week, rather than all in one go.
A glass or two with dinner each night, for example, is likely to deliver positive results whereas abstaining for six days and then polishing off two bottles in one sitting will almost definitely not!
