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Comment by Elepsis | Hacker News Reader

It's worth noting that even if there's no health benefit to regular moderate drinking, there's no argument made here that there's necessarily harm from regular moderate drinking.

So maybe the takeaway is simply that if you choose to drink moderately, don't pat yourself on the back.

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Actually it is making such an argument: "Occam’s Razor argues for a simple theory: the net marginal impact of drinking on health is negative at all levels"

They don't provide definitive proof, but that is their argument.

That seems an abuse of Occam's Razor. There are many chemicals that are known to be unhealthy in large amounts, but are healthy (even necessary) in smaller amounts. This group of chemicals includes linoleic acid, vitamin A, iron, and water.

It may certainly be true that alcohol is a net negative in any amount, but it would be in lots of good company if it turns out that small amounts of alcohol are indeed healthy.

Sorry, I was unclear. You're right that they do claim that the impact of drinking is negative, but I don't think they made any actual argument in favor of that viewpoint.

But the argument has been that "moderate" drinking is associated with increased risk vs associated with decreased risk, not that it's neutral.

The decreased risk group were suggesting that upto 6 drinks per day were linked to lower risks than teetotalism even when you adjust for chronically ill teetotalers (ie people who no longer drink because they've destroyed their liver).

A US standard drink is 18 ml of alcohol so six of those a day is quite a lot.

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