Hooray – wine is ‘good’ for us oldies? I’ll drink to that
As a new study claims that alcohol is good for women in their 60s, Joan Bakewell raises a glass to the news
Whoopee! That is the natural reaction to the headline this week that suggested that drinking regularly is good for women in their 60s. I’m in my 80s, and a regular drinker, so I gave a whoopee, too – and then read the reports with a beady eye. All is not as simple as the headline suggests.
Two researchers from the University Hospital of Bonn, Germany, kept the drinking records of 628 women patients aged 60 and over undergoing elective surgery. They found that those who drank alcohol at least twice a week – rather than total abstainers – seemed to fare better in recovery for mobility, anxiety and levels of comfort. Their paper is being presented this year at a medical conference in Milan where it will be debated – and even contested.
Several years ago, I made a Panorama programme examining the habits and health of oldies who drank a good deal. And I know from my own research that heavy drinking is bad for older people, as it is for everyone. I met men and women addicted to their daily tipple, who struggled to give up. Then, at my director’s insistence, I monitored my drinking patterns. Miniature camera in hand, I recorded dinner parties, drinking get-togethers, and my own lonely glass. To my alarm, I found I regularly exceed the Government’s recommended limit. I still do.
That’s not to say I reel around through life, scarcely able to stand. I almost never drink at lunchtime, I enjoy a glass of white wine each evening, and I never touch spirits. On current evidence, I’m surviving well.
But there is another dimension to older people’s drinking. Physical health and personal well-being have much in common but are not identical. And it’s worth monitoring both as we advance through the years. Old age has an increasing number of hazards: limbs lose their power, organs fail and memory lapses. That’s the physical side. It’s no surprise we get depressed, low-spirited, and are in need of comfort. That’s where the well-being comes in. Alcohol – in my case wine – certainly lifts the spirits, relaxing the mind and the muscles, and it is known that red wine contains antioxidants and can reduce blood sugar, among other possible benefits.
But, more significantly, it is the social background that goes with drinking that leads to well-being, which in turn helps us to recover from life’s blows, physical and emotional. Conviviality does much to keep loneliness at bay. Drink and talk, friendship and alcohol, they don’t have to go together but they certainly furnish my life with ongoing pleasure. And happy memories, too.
I recall when I was in a major national hospital going into labour with my first child and finding the going really tough and the midwife saying, “Of course what you really need is half a bottle of champagne. That would help you relax!” Frivolous, for sure, but I knew it held a truth. Then there were those moments before an interview, an exam, even a broadcast. And the times afterwards: the students who have triumphed, the job nailed. Life is full of ups and downs and alcohol can add a lilt on the way.
Now in my 80s, I grow restless at 7pm in the evening. On location, my colleagues recognise the moment. “Time for Joan’s white wine,” they say. At home, it heralds the evening news.
In the theatre, the drink in the bar before the curtain rises accompanies anticipation. Alcohol is not a thing in itself: it is a social adjunct to events that give variety and pleasure.
I can offer some good news to match this week’s report, from my Panorama research. I talked to medical experts on alcoholism who offered me sound advice. Giving up alcohol, however briefly, is really good for you, whether it’s a month, a week, or even one day a week. “Try it, Joan,” they told me, “the liver has real powers of recovery.” So at any moment – even as we grow old – we can improve our health.
And we can learn from the grandchildren: the young still, of course, get completely tanked from time to time, as they always have. But I notice that increasingly they give up on the regular row of pints, the swilling from the bottle in the style of 1930s novels. It holds no glamour for them. They find glamour elsewhere.
Meanwhile, the debate about how much is too much will continue: at the medical conference in Milan, in bars and parties around the country, as well as between old friends, caring for each other’s welfare and deciding whom to trust. I’m one of them. Won’t you join me in a glass?