Discussions about diet have been massively muddied by things that don't really matter. A lot of people have completely lost faith in nutritional science, because what they hear in the news is often confusing and contradictory.

A glass of wine per day might have a very slight benefit, or it might be slightly harmful. We're not entirely sure, because the effect size is very small either way. Have a glass of wine, don't have a glass of wine, it doesn't really matter.

We are very confident that eating fruit and vegetables is good for you. The majority of Americans eat significantly less than the recommended amount of fruit and vegetables. We are very confident that drinking more than a small amount of alcohol is bad for you. 30% of Americans drink more than the recommended amount. We are very confident that being obese is bad for you. 40% of Americans are obese.

We should probably just ignore any new studies in nutrition, because we're failing to act on stuff that we've known about for decades, stuff that most people would agree is common sense. We need to focus our efforts on getting the basics right.

There seems to be no safe dose for alcohol.

https://nutritionfacts.org/video/is-it-better-to-drink-littl...

The statement is probably true, but the provided source is one you should be skeptical of. The author is somewhat of a vegan quack.

https://sciencebasedmedicine.org/death-as-a-foodborne-illnes...

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michael_Greger

Which part of this was quackery?

Ethanol is in many of foods that we consume from yoghurt to bread and even fruit.

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5421578/

I have a genotype that causes moderate drinking to lower risk of CHD with a p value of 0.008. Check out the odds ratios for the different groups as well.

https://www.snpedia.com/index.php/Rs708272 https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/25288221

I always assumed that this had to do with antioxidants in grapes and nothing to do with alcohol itself. That's not so far fetched to me, but why not just drink grape juice?

Or go one better and eat the whole grapes.

I've heard that grapes are among the worst kinds of fruit you can eat when it comes to pesticides.

http://time.com/5234787/dirty-dozen-pesticides/

On one hand that's bad. On the other hand, not eating them might actually increase your risk of cancer.

Perceived risk from harm due to pesticides on food is overestimated by many people, and the risk of not eating more fruit and vegetables is underestimated.

"If just half the U.S. population were to increase fruit and vegetable consumption by a single serving a day, an estimated 20,000 cancer cases might be avoided each year. That’s how powerful produce may be.

But because the model was using conventional fruits and veggies the pesticide residues on those extra fruits and vegetables might result in ten additional cancer cases."

https://nutritionfacts.org/video/are-the-benefits-of-organic...

Well, if you’re already getting your vitamins elsewhere, eating a grape might not be terribly different from eating sugar. It is very odd fruits and veggies are mixed together like this when they have such a different nutritional profile.

The point of fruit is the fiber, not just the vitamins.

And how about the phytochemicals (plant compounds that are under research with unestablished effects on health and not yet scientifically defined as essential nutrients).

Well, that might cause less confusion than “fruits and veggies”, especially when juices come with “x servings of fruit” on the label.

Organic grapes exist, and this is one reason why.

It would be good to have pesticide and hazardous chemical amounts per serving listed along with the other ingredients. What an eye opener that would be. I wonder what it would take to accomplish this given that contamination happens throughout production and distribution.

A very small amount of red wine is beneficial to women over 60. No-one else gets the benefits. We've known this for a few years now.

Nah, I feel great after two bottles of wine and I'm not 60 or a woman.

Don’t wanna pun but maybe you feeling great must be inebriation. We are talking about long term health benefits here :)

Obviously. Do you really think a little addiction to alcohol could be beneficial given all the ill effects we've known about it the last 8000 years?