Tag: alcohol

Alcohol warning labels won’t make us cut down. (You won’t want to know what will.)

Alcohol. by Sarah-Jane, on Flickr“Warning! Drinking this could seriously harm your health.” Now I don’t know about you, but if I saw that on a bottle then I would think twice before letting it anywhere near my lips. But if Conservative MP Tracey Crouch gets her way, then such health warnings could be appearing on cans and bottles of all alcoholic drinks. It’s not the sort of thing you want gracing your wine cellar – seeing a black and white danger sticker on a prized 2007 bottle of Rioja will somehow take the edge off it. Read more

‘Breastfeeding is best’ unless you’ve been drinking alcohol

Mano! by Aurimas Mikalauskas, on FlickrBeing a medically trained doctor, I have learnt to always be on my guard. Not only for those inflight medical emergencies (of which I have experienced) and people collapsing in the street, but for the less urgent “will you have a look at my rash?” questions posed by neighbours. Even at parties I must be ready to give impromptu answers to medical questions.

And so it was at one jovial celebration that a good friend, glass of red wine in hand, asked me: “When I drink alcohol, does it get stored in my breast milk?” (She had recently given birth.) It was a time of celebration and she had finally managed to get her baby tucked up in his cot. It was certainly not the time for me to be a party-pooper. Sometimes, however, people say they wish they had never asked… Read more

Drinking Alcohol makes you pee more – but how much?

Original 16Too much tipple and you’ll know about it the next day.

The dreaded hangover – headaches, fatigue and nausea are normal Sunday morning sensations for many a Saturday night reveller. Dehydration is frequently said to be the reason for hangover symptoms – and some swear that a pint of tap water before bed thwarts any alcohol-induced ill-effects. But given the amount of fluid drunk during a night on the town, it sounds like quite an odd idea.

So just how dehydrating is alcohol – and can lack of water really explain a hangover? The data is difficult to find: no-one seems very interested in researching hangovers these days. It’s therefore time to blow the digital dust of a seventy year-old research paper to find an answer… Read more