Drinking a glass of alcohol is enough to raise blood pressure over the years, even in adults without hypertension, warns the American Heart Association, a US non-profit organization that aims to promote and improve heart care.
- Regular alcohol consumption can raise blood pressure over the years, starting with just one drink.
- This link between alcohol and increased blood pressure is also seen in people who did not have high blood pressure at the start of the study.
- For this work, the researchers analyzed seven studies involving more than 19,000 adults in the United States, Korea and Japan.
Regular alcohol consumption increases blood pressure over the years. This phenomenon is observed even when people drink only one glass a day as well as in individuals who do not suffer from hypertension. Here’s the caveatAmerican Heart Association after the publication of a study conducted by Italian and American researchers in its journal Hypertension July 31, 2023.
Of the evidence of the effect of alcohol on blood pressure
The study, which looked at data from multiple studies in the United States, Korea and Japan, found that people who regularly drank – even small amounts ofalcohol – showed an increase in blood pressure compared to those who did not drink at all.
In detail, the results show that systolic blood pressure increases by 1.25 mm Hg in people who consumed an average of 12 grams of alcohol per day and by 4.9 mm Hg in those who drank an average of 48 grams of alcohol per day.
For comparison, 10 grams of alcohol represents 25 cl of beer at 5° or 12.5 cl of wine at 10° to 12° or 3 cl of distilled alcohol at 40° (whiskey, anisette, gin).
In addition, diastolic blood pressure increases by 1.14 mm Hg in “light drinkers” (12 grams of alcohol per day)and 3.1 mm Hg in those who consume 4 times more. The latter association was mainly observed in men.
“We found no beneficial effects in adults who drank low levels of alcohol compared to those who drank no alcohol,” said the study’s lead author, Dr Marco Vinceti in a communicated. “We were somewhat surprised to see that drinking an already low level of alcohol was also linked to greater changes in blood pressure over time compared to no drinking – although much less than the increase in blood pressure observed in heavy drinkers”he added.
Heart health: researchers recommend limit alcohol
Faced with these results, the researchers called for limiting alcohol consumption to maintain healthy blood pressure. Since high blood pressure is a major and preventable risk factor for cardiovascular diseases such as heart attack or stroke, it is essential to raise awareness of the harmful effect of alcohol on blood pressure and to promote healthy lifestyle choices by beverage material.
“Alcohol is certainly not the only driver of increased blood pressure. However, our results confirm that it contributes significantly. It is advisable to limit the consumption of alcohol and to avoid it, it is even better”concluded Dr. Vinceti.