Moderate wine drinking can reduce diabetes risk in overweight women

A large prospective study has shown, for the first time, a long-term beneficial effect of moderate wine consumption on the risk of diabetes in overweight women.

Type 2 diabetes can be prevented by adequate lifestyle changes. Research suggests that weight loss is the main factor to reduce diabetes risk. Alcohol is one of the dietary factors that has been consistently associated with diabetes and a U-shaped relationship has been suggested. So far, no prospective study has simultaneously assessed the relationship of adult wine consumption and its cumulative effect throughout life on the diabetes risk.

A total of 66,485 women from the French prospective E3N-EPIC study were followed for a period of 14 years and 1,372 cases of Type 2 diabetes (T2D) were observed. Associations between wine and T2D were restricted to overweight women. Those consuming up to two drinks/day reduced their risk by 33% when compared with teetotallers. Also women who started to drink wine early in life (around age 10-15 years) were at a significantly lower risk than lifetime abstainers. It was concluded that there may be a potential beneficial, cumulative effect of moderate wine consumption throughout life for overweight women with a higher risk of T2D.

Fagherazzi G, Vilier A, Lajous M, et al. Wine consumption throughout life is inversely associated with type 2 diabetes risk, but only in overweight individuals: results from a large female French cohort study. Eur J Epidemiol. 2014 Nov;29(11):831-9.

For more information about this article, read the scientific abstract here.