18. Moderate alcohol intake may reduce your risk of a stroke
A stroke is a possibly fatal event during which blood flow to the brain is cut off. Faced with a cutoff of oxygen and glucose, brain cells die. A stroke may be caused by a clot that passes through the blood vessels in the brain. The clot may form in a blood vessel in a different part of the body and then make its way to the brain. This is called an ischemic stroke. A hemorrhagic stroke is caused when a blood vessel in the brain ruptures or tears.
The National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism (NIAAA) states that moderate drinking may lower the risk of an ischemic stroke. Part of a study included people who had experienced a stroke. They were interviewed about their drinking habits and had to fill out a questionnaire.
The participants were placed into four categories based on their drinking habits: light drinking, moderate drinking, high drinking and heavy drinking. The results published in BMC Medicine indicated that light-to-average alcohol consumption tended to lower the risk of an ischemic stroke, but not a hemorrhagic stroke.
Some research indicates that moderate alcohol intake lowers fibrinogen, a protein in the body that produces blood clots.