Alcohol and mortality from all causes.

A large number of prospective studies have observed an inverse relationship between a moderate intake of alcohol and coronary heart disease morbidity and mortality. Concerning death from all-causes, results are not unanimous. Alcohol intake was associated with a protection of all-cause mortality in England and USA physicians and the large study of the American Cancer Society.

Moderate wine drinkers have lower hypertension-related mortality: a prospective cohort study in French men.

Background: For a given blood pressure, the risk of death from coronary artery disease is much higher in northern Europe and the United States than in Mediterranean countries.

Objective: In this prospective cohort study, we tested the hypothesis that regular wine drinking reduces the hypertension-related risk of death.

Design: We used data from 36 583 healthy middle-aged men who had normal results on an electrocardiogram and were not taking drugs for cardiovascular disease risk factors.

Dietary fats and coronary heart disease pathogenesis.

The intake of saturated fat seems to be the main environmental factor for coronary heart disease (CHD). However, decreasing the intake of saturated fat and replacing it in part with linoleic acid in primary or secondary intervention trials did not satisfactorily reduce CHD clinical manifestations. It is only when omega-3 fatty acids, alpha-linolenic acid (ALA), or eicosapentaenoic acid (EPA) and docosahexaenoic acid (DHA) were added to the diet that sudden cardiac death (ALA, EPA plus DHA) and nonfatal myocardial infarction (only ALA) were significantly lowered.