Mastering the Art of Moderation: Unveiling the Calorie Chart for Alcohol – Lose Weight Tips

There are many opportunities that call for a toast: birthdays, weddings, or A casual get-together with a few acquaintances, for example. There's nothing wrong with having a drink from time to time, right?

One gram of pure alcohol contains 7 kilocalories (kcal). This is almost twice as much as sugar (4 kcal) and almost as much as fat (9 kcal). However, alcohol doesn't have a high nutrient density and therefore belongs to the so-called empty calories. Another problem is that our body immediately uses alcohol to produce energy due to the high amount of glucose it contains. Other available sources of energy, carbohydrates and fats, are not used by the body and are stored as fat depots.

The tricky thing about alcohol is that it gives you calories, but it also slows down fat loss. Alcohol also stimulates appetite. This means that we take in more calories, but at the same time the calories are used less well than usual.

How many calories are in beer, wine, champagne, long drinks, and other alcoholic drinks? I have taken a closer look at popular alcoholic drinks and created an easy-to-read calorie sheet. Please note that I have used the same amount (0.1 liter) for all drinks to make it easier to compare the amount of calories for different drinks.

Alcohol is certainly not part of healthy eating. However, if you don't want to give up alcoholic drinks completely, you should only enjoy them in moderation. A look at the alcohol calorie sheet shows that beer, wine, sparkling wine and all other alcoholic drinks are not exactly slimming you. Mixed drinks and delicious cocktails have a lot of calories to offer, as they are often mixed with cream, sweet fruit juice or soft drinks. The top calorie bomb is the Piña Colada, which easily contains 550 kcal for a 0.25 liter glass. That's more than half a salami pizza (950 kcal). The drink Skinny Bitch – a mixed drink made from vodka and water – is particularly low in calories.

When talking about drugs, most people first think of illegal substances such as heroin, cocaine or crystal meth. They ignore that alcohol is the most commonly used everyday drug. According to the United Nations World Drug Report, around 600,000 people die every year through the consumption of illegal drugs.

But legal drugs, especially alcohol, claim many times more victims. Alcohol kills more than three million people every year. This means that alcohol causes more deaths than all illegal drugs summarized. Every 12 seconds, someone dies as a result of drinking alcohol.

Alcohol has become an everyday drug that no one pays attention to anymore, because it is available at any time and in any place. For a long time, the image was cultivated that alcohol was not only not harmful, but even good for your general health and helped you to live longer.

Drinking alcohol over a longer period of time can have several dangerous consequences for your health. The following consequences may occur:

• The face appears swollen and red. Over the years, the skin becomes more pasty and puffy. The skin ages faster. This is true even with small amounts of alcohol.

• Brain performance decreases. Nerve cells die and brain tissue shrinks. Memory and the ability to concentrate decline.

• Cardiovascular disease risk increases. There is a risk of high blood pressure, arrhythmias, and myocarditis. Nobody needs alcohol to protect their heart. Even moderate physical exercise has more benefits.

• The risk of cancer increases. The risk of developing cancer increases with age, especially in the mouth, throat, and esophagus.

• The liver becomes weakened and damaged. There is a risk of inflammation, fatty liver, and cirrhosis.

• The reproductive organs are damaged and the ability to reproduce is reduced. Pregnant women endanger their babies and men lower their testosterone levels.

• The pancreas is attacked. This interferes with the function of the pancreas. This interferes with the digestion of fat. Painful inflammation and kidney failure are possible.

• The stomach and intestines are attacked. Gastritis and cancer are more common, especially with regular alcohol consumption.

According to the WHO, alcohol is the number one risk factor for cancer. There is no such thing like risk-free alcohol consumption. Alcohol increases the risk of cancer in any quantity. Mouth, throat, oesophagus, pancreas, intestines – alcohol is considered to cause cancer in many areas. Althougk there are limits up to them the consumption of alcohol shouldn't be very risky, more and more doctors are moving away from the opinion that alcohol is healthy. Recent research results show that alcohol is mainly responsible for 10 different types of cancer.

The breakdown of alcohol in the liver produces a highly toxic intermediate product – acetaldehyde. This substance not only damages the liver, but is also carcinogenic throughout the body. Acetaldehyde damages the DNA of stem cells and increases the occurrence of cancer through mutations in the genetic material.

Alcohol is a very high risk factor for all types of dementia. This is the conclusion of researchers from the Translational Health Economics Network, Paris after analyzing data from 32 million patients. People who drink three bottles of beer (1.5 liters) or one bottle of wine (0.7 liters) a day are three times more likely to develop dementia, including Alzheimer's disease, than those who never drink alcohol.