Female Wine Drinkers Less likely to Gain Weight than Non-drinkers

Another good reason to drink red wine (as if we needed one!) comes from a ScienceDaily report of a recent study done by researchers at Brigham and Women's Hospital, in Boston, who measured the weight gain over an average of 13 years of women who started with a body mass index in the normal range. Here’s what they found:

Compared with women who did not drink at all, those who consumed some but less than 40 grams per day of alcohol were less likely to become overweight or obese. Women who drank 15 to less than 30 grams per day had the lowest risk, which was almost 30 percent lower than that of non-drinkers.

‘An inverse association between alcohol intake and risk of becoming overweight or obese was noted for all four types of alcoholic beverages [red wine, white wine, beer and liquor], with the strongest association found for red wine and a weak yet significant association for white wine after multivariate adjustment,’ the authors write.

The women who were least likely to gain weight were occasional to moderate drinkers. Forty grams per day of alcohol is a roughly a glass of wine a day. As always moderation is the key, as is your choice of food pairing. A big chunk of brie with your glass of wine will not lead to weight loss.


flickr photo by salvis.are