Beer Has Same Benefits as Wine
Much has been said about the health benefits of a glass of red wine a day. This typical European dinner table companion does in fact offer health benefits. Less has been said however about red wine's cousin, also a common companion at the dinner table; beer. Beer does in fact share red wine's claim to health benefits when accompanied by moderation.
Firstly one might wonder why either of these have any heath benefits. Certainly, especially in North America, there is much on the ills of drinking alcohol especially regular drinking. Partly this is due to prohibition-era laws forbidding touting health benefits for alcoholic products. Only recently has much been done to point out that while it is quite common in many European nations to see a bottle of wine on the round tablecloths at dinner, these nations in many cases suffer fewer health problems.
A key benefit of both drinks is their anti-oxidant qualities. Antioxidants are critical to preventing numerous diseases. Polyphenols, which are found in both beer and wine, act as antioxidants. Taken in moderation these drinks can help add to the body's supply of antioxidants which aid among other organs, the liver; the organ most would associate with damage from alcohol.
Another benefit of beer and wine, especially red wine, is vitamins. Both drinks because of the process involved contain numerous vitamins. In fact Guinness once proudly touted that it was a relatively low calorie, high vitamin drink. With the reemergence of craft brewing and boom in independent brewers in America much has gone into ingredients that either allow more folks to enjoy a beer or stock up on ingredients understood to have health benefits. Still brewers walk a fine line as advertising laws still prevent beer from being marketed for health properties in many cases making it hard to even know what is inside the beer one is drinking.
Another important consideration in the healthiness or lack there of, of a daily beer or glass of wine is moderation. In some European nations it's socially quite normal to have a glass or two of either, daily. In some cases it's normal for men to have as many as 5. For women however, who biologically process alcohol much differently then men, no more than 3 is typical. Also the stress reducing properties of regular but moderate drinking have been discussed. Certainly there is a point where extra vitamins and other nutritional ingredients are surpassed by the fact that alcohol must go through the liver and is shown to be damaging to it. Antioxidants do aid much of the liver's normal function by filtering out many liver-damaging chemicals before they make it to the liver but will not prevent a case of hepatitis c or cirrhosis, which is a sure result of heavy drinking.
