The Latest Study That Drinkers Will Hate: No Safe Limits In Alcohol Consumption

Val Kilmer memerankan Jim Morrison dalam film The Doors (Sumber: IMDB)

JAKARTA - A recent study raised the impact of alcohol consumption on the human brain. Yes, there have been many other studies that sound minor to drinkers. But this study confirms there is no place for alcohol in our bodies.

There are still many of us who may think alcohol is safe enough to drink in small amounts. Indeed, a glass of wine or a sip of whiskey may not be intoxicating for many. But the body responds differently from the inside.

A recent University of Oxford study studied the relationship of alcohol consumption with human brain performance. The observational study involved 25,000 Britons.

Through brain scans, the researchers found people who drank alcohol had fewer brain grey areas in their brains. Brain grey is also known as gray matter, which is a major component of the central nervous system.

Gray matter consists of the body of nerve cells, neuropil, glial cells, synapses, as well as capillaries. Gray matter is distinguished from white matter because it contains many cell bodies and relatively little bermielin axons.

This is a warning to drinkers because gray matter works importantly in processing information. "The more people drink, the less volume of gray matter in their brains," Anya Topiwala, a senior clinical researcher at Oxford, quoted CNN.

Damaging though a little

According to Topiwala, the reduced volume of gray matter in the human brain is actually natural. There are common age factors that cause it, he said.

But for drinkers, alcohol contributed 0.8 percent to the reduction in gray matter. And there is no compromise on the cause of alcohol, although in small amounts it still affects this factor.

There is no safe limit to alcohol consumption, they concluded. The researchers also confirmed there is nothing better between wine, beer, or any other type of alcohol. All have the same risk.

Tony Rao, a researcher at King's College London, said the same. He said the Oxford observations were actually an affirmation that drinking any amount of alcohol still causes a risk to the brain.

"Even if drinking less, there is evidence that alcohol consumption plays a bigger role in brain damage than previously thought," he said.

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