Alcohol and mortality in middle-aged men from Eastern France

To evaluate prospectively the effect on mortality of wine drinking in Eastern France, we conducted an analysis on 34,014 consecutive middle-aged men coming for a comprehensive health appraisal between 1978 and 1983. We evaluated education, physical activity, smoking, and drinking habits by a questionnaire. Electrocardiogram, blood pressure, serum total cholesterol, and gamma-glutamyltransferase level were routinely measured. Seventy seven per cent of the subjects drank wine; there was little difference between social classes in this proportion. We evaluated mortality over 10-15 years of follow up. We estimated the relative risk (RR) of death by Cox proportional hazard models using nondrinkers as the reference and adjusting for six covariables. For an intake of 22-32 and 33-54 gm of alcohol per day, the RR of all-cause death was 0.70 [95% confidence interval (CI) = 0.59-0.82] and 0.76 (95% CI = 0.66-0.87), respectively. The lower mortality resulted from fewer deaths from cardiovascular disease and cancer. Above 128 gm per day of alcohol consumption, the RR was 1.37 (95% CI = 1.16-1.61). A moderate intake of wine (2-5 glasses per day) was associated with a 24-31% reduction in all-cause mortality, a proportion that was similar for smokers, ex-smokers, and nonsmokers.