Identification of the Argument
Laurel Ives is a chief editor of national news-making brands. She has sound knowledge of healthcare and is experienced in working for BBC Health and Telegraph medical care division. She published an article No Alcohol Safe to Drink, Global Study Confirms for BBC Health, dated August 24, 2018. The article by Laurel Ives deals with modern issues of alcohol consumption. The paper has been analyzed according to Damer’s Code of Intellectual Conduct.
The main idea of Laurel Ives is that there can not be a healthy glass of wine and a moderate level of alcohol consumption. Nevertheless, this argument might not be strong due to the burden-of-proof principle. At the beginning of her article, Laurel Ives (2018) discusses matters of common knowledge that have already been known for ages. She starts her main arguments with whether moderate drinking is quite risky. The issue is that dozens of researchers can easily prove it. Moreover, comparing health indicators of non-drinkers and alcohol-addicted people can be considered slightly irrelevant. It would be more significant to start an article with some opinions that drinking is a problem regardless of the scope of addiction.
Analysis of the Flaw in the Argument
Laurel Ives argues that some researchers consider alcohol to have a protective effect in some special conditions. This argument might not be effective because there is no safe amount of alcohol. There is a level of consumption at which the risk would be low, but there are no clear values for such doses because the evidence suggests that it is safer not to drink at all. Alcohol is closely associated with about 60 different diseases. In almost all of these cases, there is a direct relationship between the dose and the body’s response; in other words, the more a person drinks, the higher the risk of getting sick.
Scientific research does show that middle-aged and older people who drink moderate amounts of alcohol are at a lower risk of developing coronary conditions. At the same time, physical activity and a healthy diet will bring more benefits to an older person than drinking alcohol. Laurel Ives cites the Global Burden of Disease study, highlighting a difference in drinking addictions between men and women. It would be reasonable to add that alcohol consumption is associated with more significant health risks for women than for men due for solid reasons. Alcohol does much harm to women. Since the water level in female bodies is higher than in males’, the concentration of alcohol and the degree of its toxicity will be higher. What is more, a woman’s body produces fewer enzymes that break down alcohol, so it takes longer for alcohol to be eliminated from the body.
A Discussion of How Effective the Argument is and How to Improve it
Recommended alcohol consumption limits cited by Laurel Ives can be ambiguously perceived. The matter is that different ideas about restricted alcohol intake led to some confusion in talking about the benefits and harms of moderate drinking. Any attempts to find out which drinks are better for health and worse have not presented convincing results. It would be of great importance if the article contained some details that positive effects disappear with an increase in the amount of alcohol. With more intensive alcohol consumption, the association with positive health indicators is lost, and a negative correlation begins to be noted: the more a person drinks, the worse his health is.
The article by Ives could have a more significant deal with the fact that physicians are reluctant to advise patients to consume alcohol for healthy matters deliberately. The position of the World Health Organization (2022) is not completely clear. Most of the world’s recommendations say that if a person does not drink, he should not start doing that, even for health reasons (WHO, 2022). It is familiar that doctors equate the effect of alcohol with a slow poison: the decay products of alcohol destroy the body in the truest sense of the word. The author should also insist on the fact that it is necessary to be aware of the seriousness of the situation and exclude alcohol consumption. The best prevention of the habit of drinking is a complete rejection thereof. Those who never got drunk have never regretted it. Millions of drinkers bitterly regret and repent of their addiction, but this repentance is often useless for them. The burden article should state that a person must fully understand what the use of alcohol is fraught with, and then the desire to drink will likely disappear.
References
Ives, L. (2018). No alcohol safe to drink, global study confirms. BBC. Web.
World Health Organization. How can I drink alcohol safely?. Web.