[bbarn]

Of those who never drank, 40% had vascular brain lesions. Of the moderate drinkers, 45% had vascular brain lesions. Of the heavy drinkers, 44% had vascular brain lesions. Of the former heavy drinkers, 50% had vascular brain lesions.

So, I read this as "If you're a heavy drinker, it's better than being moderate or ever stopping"

Statistics are fun.

[muglug]

On paper the ones who died as heavy drinkers fare slightly better brain-wise, but they die earlier (according to the study). Quitting heavy drinking may mean you live longer, but with an impaired brain.

[SOLAR_FIELDS]

The old adage always rings true. There are lies, damn lies, and statistics. The devil is always in the details

[smt88]

"Former heavy drinkers" is going to include more people who already started having health issues than the group of current heavy drinkers

[kstrauser]

It also excludes people who died of it. No telling what their rate might be.

[imtringued]

The average age of death being 75 not only excludes heavy drinkers who didn't make it, but also excludes all the healthy people who made it well into their 80s and 90s.

[profsummergig]

Thank you for digging into the details and displaying their clear ridiculousness. As someone who finished a 750ml bottle (17 drinks) over 4 days this week, the headline had me freaking out. Whew.

[beAbU]

Wait. A bottle of wine is 17 drinks?!

Or did you finish a bottle of hard liquor in four days?

[yial]

It would have to be hard liquor. A shot is 1.5 oz / 44 ml =1 drink. 750/17=44.118

[profsummergig]

It was an interesting week.[1]

[1] See: the stock market chart.

[remram]

Those are very small variations. I would look for confounding factors, e.g. income levels, mental health, etc that could easily explain a few percent difference.

Looking at the full paper, specific factors were accounted for but the list seems kind of short for such a small statistical result. The paper acknowledge that racial minorities have a higher incidence but the data doesn't seem to contain income information... yeah.

Honestly I'm mostly surprised it came out so small.