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UC-Davis research links health benefits to wine drinking

DAVIS, Calif.-We have all heard the phrase "An apple a day keeps the doctor away." Someday, we may also be able use "A glass of wine a day keeps the heart disease away." Studies have shown there may be a direct relationship between wine consumption and heart disease, but it is still a mere theory.

The correlation between wine and health was first publicly announced with the publication of Serge Renaud's "French Paradox" report. His studies theorized about the relationship between the low heart disease rate and wine consumption in France.

At UCD, Edwin Frankel, John Kinsella, Josef Kanner, Elizabeth Parks and Bruce German first proposed a similar idea in 1993. As part of the food science department, the group was doing research on antioxidants. Their hypothesis supported the antioxidant theory of heart disease.

One of the causes of heart disease is the hardening of arteries because of a formation of plaque or atherosclerosis. According to researchers, oxidation in the blood may be a prominent reason for plaque build-up.

The UCD group's theory is that certain antioxidant chemicals called phenolics found in wine may help to decrease the oxidation in the blood stream. These phenolics can also be found in many other foods but mostly in fruit and fruit products.

Andrew Waterhouse, an associate professor of enology here at UCD, has been studying the amounts of these chemicals present in the blood after consuming a glass of wine. Other researchers studying the specific effects of the chemicals then use this data.

"We haven't proven anything, but we are gradually building a case that supports our hypothesis," he said.

However, he also explained the difficulty of performing a conclusive long-term experiment on humans.

"It would be very difficult to have a control group, because it would be impossible to conceal which group was being treated," he said. "There is no way to give a person a non-wine liquid that looks and tastes just like wine.

"What we are hoping is that someone will figure out some test that will predict whether or not you will get heart disease," he said.