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http://www.nytimes.com/2002/12/31/health/31HOW.html

How a Tonic Keeps the Parts Well Oiled

By ABIGAIL ZUGER

drink or two a day provides the equivalent of a potent cholesterol medicine and a weak blood thinner, as well as a variety of other substances that may keep the body's metabolism tuned and its cells in good repair.

Alcohol raises the blood levels of H.D.L., the "good" cholesterol, thought to scour blood vessels free of the fatty plaques that can cause heart attacks, strokes and other problems. Moderate drinking can raise the levels more than 10 percent. Heavy drinking raises them even higher.

By comparison, running a few miles a week increases H.D.L. a fraction of that, while the B vitamin niacin, probably the most effective medication for raising H.D.L. levels, has to be taken at high doses that entail many side effects for similar results.

The statin low-cholesterol drugs, which work by reducing L.D.L., or "bad" cholesterol, seldom raise H.D.L. levels substantially.

Researchers estimate that half the heart benefits of moderate drinking stem directly from the H.D.L. gain.

Alcohol also makes the blood flow a little more freely, by decreasing blood proteins that promote clotting and increasing those that prevent clotting. Like low-dose aspirin, which also helps prevent heart attacks, alcohol keeps the tiny blood cells called platelets from adhering to one another and forming damaging clots.

Alcohol may also help the heart by preventing diabetes, a risk factor for heart disease. Moderate drinkers are on average a little thinner than nondrinkers and less likely to develop the diabetes associated with obesity and insulin resistance.

A study published in May in The Journal of the American Medical Association confirmed that those associations were not coincidental. When healthy postmenopausal women were assigned to drink two drinks a day for two months, they became more sensitive to insulin, with more efficient metabolisms and reduced risk of diabetes.

Whether alcoholic drinks have other powers is the subject of much research. Besides alcohol, red wine contains hundreds of natural antioxidants, mostly derived from grape skins and seeds.

The antioxidant activity in a glass of red wine equals that in 7 glasses of orange juice or 20 of apple juice, one researcher estimates. Some white wines and dark beers have the same antioxidant activity.

Antioxidants are widely thought to have a host of good effects, like increasing tissue blood flow and protecting cells from oxidative injury much as rustproofing protects a car chassis.

Last December, researchers in London announced in the journal Nature that alcohol-free extracts of red wines kept blood vessel cells from producing endothelin-1, a chemical that constricts blood vessels. That may mean that red wine enhances the blood flow to organs like the heart and brain above what might be expected from its alcohol content.

Other researchers have found that the antioxidants in wine can keep heart muscle cells from dying.

"Some actually trigger a survival signal," said Dr. Dipak K. Das, director of the cardiovascular research center at the University of Connecticut School of Medicine. "They rescue the cells."

The role of antioxidants from alcoholic beverages in preventing disease remains controversial. The most convincing experiments have been performed in cells and laboratory animals, but not people.

Skeptics point to questions lurking over one antioxidant, vitamin E. Despite test tube and animal data that support its ability to prevent or ease heart disease, studies in people have yielded conflicting results.

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ALL INFORMATION, DATA, AND MATERIAL CONTAINED, PRESENTED, OR PROVIDED HERE IS FOR GENERAL INFORMATION PURPOSES ONLY AND IS NOT TO BE CONSTRUED AS REFLECTING THE KNOWLEDGE OR OPINIONS OF THE PUBLISHER, AND IS NOT TO BE CONSTRUED OR INTENDED AS PROVIDING MEDICAL OR LEGAL ADVICE.  THE DECISION WHETHER OR NOT TO VACCINATE IS AN IMPORTANT AND COMPLEX ISSUE AND SHOULD BE MADE BY YOU, AND YOU ALONE, IN CONSULTATION WITH YOUR HEALTH CARE PROVIDER.