Alcohol wards off dementia? New study suggests yes, but some experts disagree

10 Oct 2022 --- As many consumers participate in “Sober October,” a new study is revealing that abstinence from alcohol is correlated with an increased risk of developing dementia. Moreover, the researchers hold that there is no evidence to link drinking later in life with the risk of dementia development.

The researchers further found that light-to-moderate and occasional drinkers had the lowest decreased risk of developing dementia while moderate-to-heavy drinkers had the highest decrease when compared to people who abstain from all alcohol.

However, some experts, such as those at the European Food Information Council (EUFIC), are skeptical of the study results.

EUFIC representatives have stated that the study does not provide enough evidence to prove that alcohol is a protectant against dementia, may not have used a representative population and further states that increased health risks associated with alcohol consumption may outweigh any protective benefit.The study states that moderate drinkers may decrease their risk of developing dementia by 39%.

Representative sampling?
The study, published in Addiction and conducted at the University of New South Wales in Sydney, Australia, used a meta-analysis of the data from 15 epidemiological cohort studies from six continents to assess the risk of dementia associated with alcohol use in adults over the age of 60 and stratified the results by continent and sex. Altogether, data from 24,478 individual participants was used to determine factors for all-cause dementia.

According to the study, low-to-moderate and occasional drinkers reduce their risk of developing dementia by 12% while heavy drinkers decrease their risk by 19% and moderate-to-heavy drinkers by 39%. Moreover, they found no difference in risk between those who abstain and those who formally drank.

The EUFIC holds that the study originally contained 33,532 individuals and states that the exclusion of over 9,000 individuals due to incomplete data such as missing baselines and missing follow-ups may have altered the findings since there were “significant differences between participants and non-participants in terms of socio-demographics, health status and alcohol use.”

Do not start drinking
The authors state that the conclusions of the study, though revealing a strong correlation, do not offer a cause or reason for the seeming association.

Additionally, as heavy alcohol use and alcohol use disorder are causally associated with dementia and Wernicke-Korsakoff syndrome – an alcohol-induced form of dementia – the authors, therefore, state that “advising those who currently abstain to initiate drinking is not recommended.” The study authors make clear that those who currently abstain should not start drinking.

According to the EUFIC, the results actually showed great variation among the subgroups. They noted that some studies did show that alcohol could be a protective factor in Oceania, but the reverse was found in the US. 

The EUFIC also states that how alcohol intake was assessed in the included studies also had high degrees of variation with some using glasses consumed, units consumed or even frequency as the measure. They further state that most were based on self-reporting which is “prone to underreporting.” It states that the type of drinks (beer, liquor, wine) also varied widely. 

One thing on which both the study and EUFIC do agree is that more research is needed to further understand the correlation between alcohol consumption and dementia.

Edited by William Bradford Nichols