A new study says a daily glass of wine or bottle of light beer -- or maybe even two -- may help women maintain a healthy weight.
In a report in today's edition of the Archives of Internal Medicine, researchers from Brigham and Women's Hospital in Boston say that normal-weight women who drank a small to moderate amount of alcohol daily (5 to 30 grams) had an easier time avoiding long-term weight gain than those who drank too much or not at all.
A 5-ounce glass of red wine contains 15 to 16 grams of alcohol, while a 12-ounce light beer contains about 11 grams, and 1.5 ounces of 80-proof whiskey contains abut 14 grams.
Still, the authors of the study, led by Dr. Lu Wang of Brigham and Women's, cautioned against recommending alcohol consumption for weight loss. "Any recommendation on alcohol use should be made for the individual after carefully evaluating both adverse and beneficial effects of the drinking behavior in broad context," the report said.
The researchers analyzed data collected over an average of nearly 13 years from 19,220 women aged 38 and older who were disease-free and had a normal body mass index (BMI) at the beginning of the study.
