There are many misconceptions in the society regarding the consumption of alcohol. Many people believe that only those who drink daily get sick, whereas it is absolutely safe to drink alcohol only once a week or occasionally on the weekend. But the truth of medical science and health experts says something else. The reality is that even occasional drinking can have a direct impact on the internal organs of your body. How serious this harm will be depends entirely on your age, pre-existing diseases, lifestyle and most importantly, the amount you are drinking at one go.
Recently, in the famous ‘Healthyy Podcast’, a very eye-opening mathematics regarding weight and calories has been explained. According to this podcast, people who abstain for a week to lose weight often get fooled on the weekend by wondering what a day of drinking will do. For example, if you drink just two beers and eat some fried snacks as a snack, then your body will consume about 1200 calories just from this. Whereas a normal person needs a total of 1600 calories in a whole day. This simply means that all the calories you had saved by working hard throughout the week were completely wasted in just one evening of partying.
Senior Doctor Deepak Sahota of Pooja Super Specialty Clinic, Ambala gives very important and practical information on this subject. According to Dr. Deepak Sahota, if a completely healthy person consumes alcohol only once a week and that too in limited quantity to about 60 ml, then it can be considered in the relatively safe category for most people.
However, Dr. Sahota also gives a big warning along with this. They say that “low dose” does not mean that the risk to your health is completely eliminated. Even if you are drinking only once a week, but even on that one day, if you cross the limit i.e. drink more than required, then it suddenly puts a huge pressure on the most important organs of your body.
People who control themselves throughout the week and consume excessive amounts of alcohol in a short period of time on any one day (like Saturday or Sunday night), this habit is called ‘Binge Drinking’ in medical science. According to health experts, this habit can prove to be more dangerous than drinking a little every day. Sudden ingestion of such a large amount of alcohol can cause damage to the entire liver system, heart beats can become irregular and in severe cases, it can even cause sudden cardiac arrest or even death. Even if this habit is for just one day a week, it spoils the entire biological balance of the body.
Effect on liver and kidney: Our liver does the main work of filtering and breaking down the alcohol reaching our body. When you drink heavy amounts of alcohol regularly or even once a week, it puts excessive strain on the liver cells. By doing this for a long time, the problem of ‘fatty liver’ gradually starts, which can later turn into liver cirrhosis. Apart from this, alcohol absorbs essential water from the body which causes dehydration. Due to lack of water, the kidneys have to work twice as hard to clean the blood, which affects the efficiency of the kidneys.
Heart and blood pressure problems: Alcohol has a direct and very bad effect on our cardiovascular system. The blood pressure of the body can increase suddenly after drinking alcohol. The most dangerous situation arises when people start smoking cigarettes or junk along with alcohol. By doing this the risk of heart attack and coronary artery disease increases manifold.
Sleep and digestion junk: Many people feel that they sleep better after drinking alcohol. According to doctors, this is just an illusion. After drinking alcohol, a person falls asleep quickly in an unconscious state, but he is never able to get deep and comfortable sleep (REM sleep). This is the reason why a person feels extremely tired, headache and irritable the next day after drinking. Additionally, excess alcohol causes diseases like stomach acidity, heartburn and gastric ulcers. In severe cases, the intestines become swollen and internal bleeding may also begin.
According to medical guidelines, there are some conditions and diseases in which drinking even occasionally is like inviting death. Pregnant women should completely stay away from alcohol as it directly harms the brain of the baby growing in the womb. Apart from this, people who are already suffering from serious liver, kidney or heart diseases, who have mental problems like depression or anxiety, or who are taking regular medicines for any serious disease – they should abstain from alcohol. Also, drinking and driving is not only a legal offense but also playing with your own and others’ lives.
