Drinking and Mortality: The Framingham Study

Drinking and subsequent mortality were examined in a cohort of 5,209 men and women from Framingham, Massachusetts. Alcohol histories were obtained at the second biennial examination (1950-1954) from 2,106 men and 2,641 women. Of this group, 646 men and 521 women died in the next 22 years. Unlike what is reported from most other prospective studies, men who drank had lower mortality than men who did not, the lowest mortality being for light drinkers. Even men drinking 60 ounces of alcohol per month or more had no greater mortality than nondrinkers. Drinking by women was unrelated to subsequent mortality. For most alcohol-related causes, there were too few deaths to analyze. Liver cirrhosis, however, accounted for 24 deaths. Although these were related to alcohol use, more than half of the persons dying from this cause reported drinking less than 60 ounces of alcohol per month at baseline. There was, however, a very strong association of heavy alcohol consumption with stomach cancer, but not with any other cancer.