The 2015 Dutch Food-Based Dietary Guidelines on Alcohol Consumption - A Critical Review

Background: Recently the Dutch Health Council has issued a revised alcohol guideline stating: Do not drink alcohol, or if any only drink one glass daily. e current guidelines are intended to obtain the lowest disease burden of the most burdensome diseases in e Netherlands. e current paper aims to estimate the overall impact of alcohol consumption on these diseases.
Methods: e meta-analyses selected by the Council were used to estimate the association between alcohol consumption and overall disease risk. e risk association was estimated by totaling all available separate associations. Similarly, incidences numbers and Disability-Adjusted Life Years (DALY’s) were calculated.
Results: Data show that the cumulative risk is lowest for the alcohol consumption categories 2.5-14.9 g alcohol/day and the category 15 to 29.9 g alcohol/day. Also, the lowest number of diseases incidence and the lowest disease burden were observed in these drinking categories for both Dutch men and women.
Conclusion: is paper suggests that moderate alcohol consumption of up to 30 g of alcohol per day is associated with the lowest risk for the most burdensome diseases in the Netherlands for both men and women.