There are no safe levels of Alcohol consumption ....

[swee'pea99]

They'll be telling us we shouldn't smoke next.

 

[bancrobba]

When I was a lad we used to get rum, lard and ciggies on bloody NHS.

 

[vernon]

On the north west news tonight they mentioned the 3 billion pounds alcohol abuse costs the region each year. Conveniently forgetting to mention how much tax revenue is generated by the heavy drinking.

You've forgotten about the constant recruitment drive needed to replace the 6-7000 folk who die each year and whose deaths are alcohol related.

 

[Arrowfoot]

There should be a fee charged to cover cost of Police, Ambulance and A&E for handling binge drinking and the likes. £200 a hit with installment payments made available. Have witnessed enough abuse hurled at our first responders that something has to give.

 

[byegad]

"There is no pleasure worth forgoing just for an extra three years in the geriatric ward."

John Mortimer

The rationale in setting these limits is the idea of not significantly increasing your chances of developing a fatal condition. I suspect that they get so engrossed in looking at the micromorts that they forget that we all die anyway.

I for one have in the past consumed more alcohol than is sensible, mostly in response to stress. At that time the idea it may shorten my life was irrelevant. These days while I like a drink now and again I'm not going to increase my consumption to 7 pints a week.

 

[jayonabike]

14 units a week.
A week is 24 hours? Right?

 

[Dayvo]

It's simple:

everything in moderation, and I mean EVERYTHING!

 

[vernon]

You need to do the sums on that.

And familiarise himself with hypothecated taxation.

 

[Levo-Lon]

You do have to wonder how they arive these figures..

on a good note, Black Pudding is now good for you..so the up norf lot will counter the alchohol risj.l

 

[nickyboy]

To try to bring a bit of serious discussion to a serious topic......

The difference in attitudes towards smoking and drinking is quite startling. The link between smoking and health issues is well established. In large parts of the society it is now seen as socially unacceptable to smoke. % of the population who smoke is much lower than it was.

Fast forward to alcohol. It seems that the link between drinking (in any quantity) and health issues is becoming established. So other than the level by which drinking alcohol is part of our culture (much more so than smoking ever was) I wonder what is the difference between where we are with alcohol and where we were with smoking, say, 50 years ago. At a time when we just started to understand the health issues

I enjoy drinking alcohol (just go and look at the beer thread). But the hard statistics showing the relationship between alcohol consumption in small quantities and serious illness makes me step back and think. In the past it was heavy alcohol consumption that was the issue. Now it seems that practically any level increases one's risk of serious illness

 

[nickyboy]

It's simple:

everything in moderation, and I mean EVERYTHING!

Is smoking in moderation OK?

 

[nickyboy]

Then again, life itself increases one's risk of serious illness.

Personally, I think the new guidelines strike the right balance (Mr R agrees) - the reporting of them was abysmal, but such a reaction has come to expected, even from the supposedly serious media. Controversy sells...

I'd tend to agree with him although I'm not a health professional.

What I'm seeking to show is that the somewhat flippant attitude shown to this issue is not dissimilar to that shown to smoking health issues when the link first became clear

 

[Dayvo]

Is smoking in moderation OK?

I don't see why not.

I don't know if you were be serious but I was being ironic.

 

[Andy_R]

Don't forget, breathing is bad for you too. If you do it for too long, you die.

 

[Hitchington]

Then again, life itself increases one's risk of serious illness.

Personally, I think the new guidelines strike the right balance (Mr R agrees) - the reporting of them was abysmal, but such a reaction has come to expected, even from the supposedly serious media. Controversy sells...

There has been plenty of frothing on the radio from "free" market thinkers about government interfering in people's lives, nanny state etc. What the reactionary fools seem to neglect is that these are just guidelines, no one is going to prison if they go over the 14 units a week recommendation.