Because alcohol consumption is a very wide topic and is embedded in American society due to its legality and its dominance over social situations where you can pretty much see every adult having a drink in their hands, it is hard to formulate an opinion on whether alcohol could be considered as a beneficial or detrimental drink. However, although a lot of research mentioned that alcohol did have some benefits associated with it, it also mentioned that those benefits are not compared to the harm that could result from it.

First, most of the research agrees on the detestable side effects of over drinking or drinking above moderately. Second, many researchers agree that moderate drinking is dangerous because it could lead to some bad side effects as well in addition to the possibility of turning into over drinking. In other words, there’s a thin line between moderate drinking and over drinking that sometimes is unidentifiable. Third, some research concluded that drinking itself has a bad effect on a person’s physical and mental health regardless of its frequency or intensity.

Drinking is clearly a societal issue, so why do people keep doing it?

The first obvious reason is because drinking alcohol is very interwoven in the society’s social fabric. It’s basically everywhere, but because something is widely consumed doesn’t mean it’s good for us. Another reason why alcohol is largely consumed is because it’s an easy remedy, or so do people think of it. In a survey I made, there was a question about how does alcohol affect you physically/emotionally? Most of the answers given said that alcohol made them feel more relaxed and unwinding or even adventurous, which are traits that some may find appealing or desired. However, we fail to see the other side of it. Many other answers to the same question included stories about people who were very successful and lost almost everything to drinking. Alcohol may be a sanction for some people, especially those who suffer emotional difficulties, in their cases alcohol is a painkiller to their suffering but on the long run it actually does the opposite. but that’s doesn’t mean it’s a cure, on the contrary it only worsens the situation.

How could moderate drinking affect you negatively?

Now you’re probably thinking that those negative effects are related to alcoholism and not alcohol consumption itself. However, even though moderate drinking has been proven to have negative side effects on the body and the mind it’s also been proven that in most cases moderate alcohol consumption eventually leads to alcoholism. According to the National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism, alcohol consumption may start as social and moderate however, the risks of it developing into an addiction are very high. In addition to that, as mentioned before, since alcohol does have a relaxing effect, people sometime resort to it as a stress relief drink or even just to lighten up the mood, however slipping into a vicious cycle of alcohol consumption usually becomes the natural end of the path.

Furthermore, moderate drinking itself is correlated to many health problems. According to the CDC “The Guidelines note, “Emerging evidence suggests that even drinking within the recommended limits may increase the overall risk of death from various causes, such as from several types of cancer and some forms of cardiovascular disease. Alcohol has been found to increase risk for cancer, and for some types of cancer, the risk increases even at low levels of alcohol consumption (less than 1 drink in a day).” Recent studies have shown that even moderate drinking can be damaging to your health.

Not to mention the indirect incidents related to alcohol like drunk driving. According to the NYC website, drunk drivers cause more than 17,000 deaths annually, more than 30% of fatal car crashes are alcohol related. The victims of those crashes may not be even involved in drinking, however, they and their families are affected in a huge way. If not consuming alcohol would save the life of even one person, it’s worth doing, imagine 17,000/year!

To conclude, Even though there are some research that say minimal alcohol consumption could benefit you, those risks are not compared to its risks, whether physical like liver failure, cancer, and heart diseases, to mental like schizophrenia, depression and of course addiction.