A Votre Sante!

When I hear about the health benefits of wine and red wine in particular it makes me quite happy if not just a bit relieved! For someone who loves wine and who drinks a glass or two of wine most nights with dinner(and on special occasions which could be loosely defined as a night we open a particularly interesting, fine wine, a glass or two more ), I am more than interested to hear the positives of my imbibing activities…

Since I first heard of the highly publicized French paradox a number of years ago, my interest was peaked. The French paradox refers to the French who eat a diet with a tremendous amount of fat in it, yet have a very low incidence of heart disease. But this report was a bit vague and I had been to France and it seemed obvious to me that their culture of walking and cycling everywhere as well as seldom overeating, probably had as much to do with their healthy hearts as their consumption of red wine.

In the past few years a lot of attention has been given to this subject and much more has been discovered. Most of us have heard that moderate wine consumption is good for your heart. What many have not heard is that the findings on the health benefits of wine are much broader then just that. Other positive health benefits
are being proven by serious medical studies including: delaying dementia such as Alzheimer’s, preventing rheumatoid arthritis and an increased bone density in older women, reduction of colds in wine drinkers by up to 50% over non wine drinkers, protection against the flu, lower type 2 diabetes risk, reducing throat cancer risk, maximizing melatonin while detoxifying cells and providing powerful antioxidants, and increasing those healthy fatty acids omega 3’s !

While I am happy to say I am a very healthy person, at 47 I am probably too young to experience the onset of many of the health problems wine consumption could be a help to. I can say, my lack of getting the common cold and the flu year after year while my coworkers hacked and coughed there way through the season was often a mystery to all of us as well as an annoyance to everyone but me! And as great as it is rarely getting the cold or the flu, I have to be honest, when it boils down to it, it matters little to me the health benefits of wine. Now don’t get me wrong. I am elated to know one of the biggest pleasures in my life will not only not kill me, but will in fact make me even healthier! But it is the other positive benefits wine brings to the quality of my life that mean the most to me. Every event, from the sharing of a weekday dinner with your family to the most important of occasions such as a wedding celebration, is just that much more special with a great glass of wine! The happiness I feel when I share a great bottle of wine or two along side a good meal with dear friends is to my life, the healthiest benefit of all. And now it
appears I will be able to enjoy this simple pleasure for many healthy years to come!