Beer Cures Cancer!
image courtesy of brewsci.com
…OK, so beer doesn’t really cure cancer. I know that’s a hyperbolic headline up there with something from the Weekly World News.
Still, it’s hard not to be excited about the cancer-fighting properties of beer that have been getting quite a bit of press this week.
Britain’s second-largest paper, the UK Daily Mail, reported this week on the cancer-fighting properties of xanthohumol – a substance found in hops. While scientists have known for years that xanthohumol helps to block the production of excess estrogen, this new study by the German Cancer Research Centre in Heidelberg was the first to show that the substance can inhibit the “excessive action of testosterone.” Since excessive hormones can stimulate undue cell growth (and thus, can lead to cancer), a substance that inhibits this growth has potential as a cancer-fighting drug. Xanthohumol also prevents “the release of a protein called PSA which encourages the spread of prostate cancer.”
And it’s in beer! The hoppier the better, too, since hops are the magic ingredient that brings xanthohumol to beer.
Of course, it’s easy to dismiss an article like this as another example of media hullabaloo – “HEY LOOK, something you thought was bad for you is good for you!” We’ve seen plenty of articles over the years touting the health benefits of wine, red meat, chocolate, and other “bad” food and drink. Still, the new findings about xanthohumol join quite the laundry list of beer benefits.
For example;
- Beer helps you fulfill your daily requirements for vitamins – specifically, A, D, E and B-vitamins. A couple pints will give you “35% of the daily requirement of vitamin B6, 20% of the requirement of B2 and 65% of the requirement of Niacin.”
- Beer can help lower you chance of coronary heart disease. The decrease in heart disease risk for moderate drinkers isn’t insignificant. In fact, the decrease in risk is pretty substantial – 40%-60%, according to a 2004 study by the NIAAA.
- Light to moderate beer drinkers would decrease their chances of suffering a stroke by 20%, according to a 1999 study in the The New England Journal of Medicine.
- Beer – especially a good robust brew – provides plenty of fiber. A couple of beer contain 20% of the recommended daily intake of fiber on average. Some beers even provide up to 60%.
- Moderate beer consumption has been proven to have a positive effect on bone health – specifically, on bone mineral density. A recent Tufts University study found that “high levels of an ingredient that enables the deposit of calcium and other minerals into bone tissue.”
- Beer lowers inhibitions, and thus increases the likelihood of a drinker singing karaoke. I’m not sure about the health benefits of singing a Bon Jovi track to a bar, but I’m going to guess it’s a net positive.
- Drinking a bit of beer or wine also helps to increase the production of HDL (aka “good”) cholesterol. High HDL levels can help remove bad cholesterol, and thus help keep arteries clear.
Obviously, the key (noted in all of these studies) is moderation. I know that you RateBeerians already knew that, but it’s worth mentioning to cover my own hide – I don’t want people over-drinking and blaming me when they don’t become pictures of health. Drinking a beer a night or a couple beers a week, though? There’s no question that beer’s effect on the body isn’t all puppies and rainbows, and I don’t think doctor’s offices will have attached bars any time soon, but the stuff is looking pretty damn good.
Did I miss any notable health benefits of our favorite libation? Do the health benefits of beer even enter your mind when you’re deciding whether to have a drink? Are my glasses just too rose-colored, or should we celebrate every announcement of a benefit of beer?
Now if you’ll excuse me, I’m going to help myself to a cancer-fighting, vitamin-providing, stroke-preventing pint of Coney Island Lager.
7 Comments to “Beer Cures Cancer!”
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Always heard it was good for you in moderation but didn’t know all the vitamins involved. Very informative.
Also helps cure insomnia.
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You’re making me thirsty! Now I have a better excuse than, “it tastes great!”
I’ll have to show this to my MD at my next physical… it helps to explain why I’m so healthy (seriously).
My doc always says that I’m as healthy as someone half my age!!
Thanks for all the great info… the key is “moderation.”
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I keep telling people that I haven’t gotten sick this winter because of beer. So I guess it’s true!
I have been drinking a lot of hoppy beers the last few months. In the past I was drinking more wine and spirits with an occasional beer (I like to alternate).
Some of this information is utterly ridiculous.
sure, Beer might give you some vitamins, however, the metabolism of the ethanol in the beer will more than very probably cost you more B-complex vitamins than the beer puts into your system.
Conversely, drinking beer increases your chances of getting mouth cancer, although personally, the risk increase against the base risk is enough that personally, I’ll keep quaffing the beers.
the main problem with all alcoholic beverages is that whilst the Ethanol isn’t too harsh, the acetaldehyde that the liver converts it into is pretty toxic (and this is why methanol is generally fatal, it metabolises into formaldehyde – ’nuff said)
With all that said, beer is one of the best tipples simply because the level of alcohol in it is generally lower than wines and certainly lower than spirits.
Olipro,
Thanks for dropping some science. Although I did my best to cite my sources, it’s obvious that a lot of the original authors did their best to accentuate the positive and leave out the less appetizing bits – just as I did.
Though I thought some had a whiff of “don’t forget to read the fine print”, thank you for taking the time to explain some of the science involved.
Cheers,
Josh