Both drinking patterns (drinking a lot at once, or a lot throughout the week) come with risks and harms. While binge drinking increases your risk of alcohol poisoning, injuries, accidents, and aggression, daily drinking can lead to liver damage, cancer, and an alcohol use disorder.
While drinking may provide temporary relief, research shows that it disrupts mood and sleep quality, leading to worsened stress and anxiety once alcohol intoxication wears off.
Alcohol use can also worsen depression, which frequently co-occurs with anxiety.
Engaging in heavy or binge drinking socially or occasionally can contribute to alcohol harms and alcoholism, better known as alcohol use disorder. Learn more.
Even the healthiest, most active people face risks from alcohol. These include injuries, poor sleep quality, weight gain, alcohol poisoning, illness, disease, infertility, mental health problems, and an early death.
Consuming more than 2 standard drinks per week or per occasion significantly increases these risks. Learn more.
Recent research shows that red or white wine increases the risk of cancer, heart disease, and other health problems just like other types of alcohol.
Even though red wine contains small amounts of antioxidant and anti-inflammatory compounds, these aren’t strongly linked to good health.
The World Health Organization labels alcohol as a Type 1 carcinogen, the same as it does tobacco.
Alcohol is causally linked to seven types of cancer: breast, liver, colorectal, pancreatic, mouth and throat, esophageal, and laryngeal cancer. Learn more.