Alcohol Consumption Creates Oxidative Damage

Though many young people often indulge in a drink or two over the weekend, a recent study shows that this small consumption of alcohol can actually cause detrimental damage to your DNA.

According to the World Health Organization (WHO), it's currently estimated that 2.5 million deaths are due to alcohol each year alone across the globe, and unfortunately, youngsters between the ages of 19 and 25 account for 320,000 of them.

Researchers from the National Polytechnic Institute in Mexico came up with an idea to start studying the oxidative effects of weekend alcohol consumption. According to lead study author Adela Rendon of the Institute, many students who showed up to class Monday also demonstrated a lack of attention due to hangover. Therefore, researchers suggested that students study how alcohol affects their bodies-even though most went into this research project with the idea that it was harmless.

Students were divided into two groups: the control group made up of the students who did not drink alcohol and the study group of those who drank on the weekends. To make sure no other genetic effects altered the findings, researchers had each student undergo a blood test, as well. All participants ranged in age between 18 and 23, with an average consumption of alcohol of 118g, and a litre and a half of beer.

Though they expected to find oxidative damage to cells, researchers noted that they were a bit surprised at how much was done.

"We saw that the ones who drank sustained twice as much oxidative damage compared with the group that did not consume alcohol," and they decided to continue with a test to assess whether the DNA was also affected: the comet test. They extracted the nucleus of the lymphocytic cells in the blood and subjected it to electrophoresis, according to a press release. "The interesting thing is that if the chromatin is not properly compacted, if the DNA has been damaged, it leaves a halo in the electrophoresis," that's known as "the comet tail."

More specifically, the exposed group showed 5.3 times more damaged cells than the control group who did not consume alcohol.

Though researchers note that the existence of considerable damage to the DNA was not seen, there should not have been any damage at all as the participants had not been exposed to alcohol over a long period of time. Therefore, researchers are still uncertain at how alcohol manages to alter DNA. Their next step is to study the re-packaging of chromatin.

"When we talk about youth alcohol abuse, we are referring to youngsters who drink alcohol without having become addicted. Addiction involves a more complex issue socially and psychologically speaking. This is social alcohol abuse," said the researcher, via the release, "but which causes damage in the long term and you have to be aware of that."

More information regarding the study can be found via the journal Alcohol.