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By Perry Gil S. Mallari, Reporter
Wine was once deemed a vice, along with women,
song and anything else too alluring, intoxicating and delicious.
It may sound too good to be true, but wine
drinking is virtue.
Often blamed for societal woes, wine has been
proven by modern science to yield health benefits, specifically to
the heart. Among the earliest and perhaps most popular of such
suppositions is the so called “French paradox.” The French
paradox is a reference to the low incidence of heart ailment among
French despite their diet being relatively rich in saturated fat.
This was attributed to the fact that in France, red wine is
regularly consumed on mealtime. The Irish doctor Samuel Black first
noted the French paradox in 1819.
Wine is an alcoholic beverage produced by the
fermentation of grape juice. Men may have been producing and
drinking wine since 8,000 years ago as indicated by recent
archeological findings. A 1996 issue of Archeology Magazine
published an article stating that a Neolithic village site in Iran
could have been the home of the world’s earliest wine. Today, new
scientific findings on the health benefits of wine are boosting once
again the consumption of wine.
The media buzz on the health benefits of wine
can be traced back to a feature on the healthy effects of red wine
by the popular American TV program 60 Minutes in 1991. That
particular segment was said to have cause an upsurge of the global
demand on red wine with some manufacturers even lobbying for their
wines to be labeled as “health food.”
Based on scientific research, resveratrol is one
component of red wine that is linked to longevity and cancer
prevention. Some experts argue though that its concentration in wine
is not enough to elicit the French paradox. In addition to
resveratrol the scientific team led by Professor Roger Corder have
pinpointed a particular group of chemical substance polyphenol,
known as oligomeric procyanidins in wine. Their study suggests that
these components of wine give the greatest degree of protection to
human blood-vessel cells.
A more recent study conducted by Wilhelm Vetter,
MD and his team at the University Hospital of Zurich, Switzerland
suggests that wine consumed during mealtime can slow down the
production of smooth muscle cells (SMC) on the arterial walls.
Medical research has proven that SMC growth is the main factor in
the development of atherosclerosis (a chronic inflammatory response
in the walls of arteries) leading to heart attack and stroke.
So, what degree of wine consumption is
considered healthy? Previous studies have suggested that drinking a
glass of wine a day can yield the necessary cardiovascular benefits.
This leads many to wonder if, given the high
cost of wine in the Philippines, it is possible for the common Pinoy
to elicit the French paradox by drinking beer. A 16-year study
conducted by Dr. Thomas Truelsen of Copenhagen University Hospital
published in the December, 1998 issue of the Journal of the American
Heart Association, says there is no association between intake of
beer or spirits on the risk of stroke.
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