Red wine may be safer than white wine
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By Maria Cendejas
Tuesday Jan 10, 2012 (foodconsumer.org) -- A recent study suggests that a few glasses of red wine might help prevent breast cancer.
The study found that a woman who drank just about 2 servings of red wine daily experienced hormonal changes, that imitate the effects of the drug that prevents malignant breast cancer tumors from coming back, according to Los Angeles Times.
Researchers found that consuming the same amount of white wine did not have the same effect in premenopausal women who participated in the study. The study was published in the Journal of Women’s Health.
Women who want to avoid breast cancer may have been aware of the link between alcohol consumption and breast cancer.
A recent study in November found that women who consumed 3 servings of alcohol a week increased their risk of developing breast cancer, which afflicts 1 in 8 women in America.
In fact, the National Toxicology program has recognized that drinking alcohol as a human carcinogen because evidence is sufficient to prove that consumption of alcoholic beverages like red wine can increase risk of cancer.
Red wine acts different than white wine. Instead of promoting the conversion of androgens to estrogen in the woman’s body the blocks that process. It acts more like a drug called aromatase inhibitors which is prescribed to women who have been diagnosed with breast cancer to prevent it from happening again.
Resveratrol one of the phytochemicals found in red wine was linked to a disease-preventing process.
Phytochemical are found in red grapes, grape seed extract, and grape juice.
The study of Cedars-Sinai and team from the Heart Institute and Medical Center found that women who drank 8 ounces of red wine daily showed a very different mix of seven sex hormones from those who drank white wine.
It was a small group of 36 women that participated in the study and the average age was 36.
The authors say its was the first study to find that red wine is a "nutritional aromatase inhibitor in healthy premenopausal women.
A health observer pointed out that the study was misleading. It compared red wine with white wine and found red wine is better than white wine in term of the hormone profile. But the study did not compare drinking red wine with those who did not drink wine of any type.
It remains unknown whether women drinking red wine have lower risk than those who do not drink any wine.
Breast cancer is expected to be diagnosed in more than 200,000 women each year in the United States. The disease and complications kill; about 50,000 annually in the country, according to the National Cancer Institute.
U.S. physicians recommend if you drink alcohol, drink it in moderation and if you don't, don't get started.
Again, consumption of alcoholic beverages is a human carcinogen, according to the National Toxicology Program.
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