Not drinking alcohol significantly increases the risk of developing multiple sclerosis (MS), especially if a person also is a current or former smoker, according to a new study.
These findings add to the knowledge, discovered in multiple previous studies, that alcohol decreases the activity of the immune system. According to the researchers, this may account for the known connection between alcohol consumption and reduced MS risk — given that MS is characterized by an overactive immune system.
While these new data “are relevant for clinical practice and give no support for advising healthy individuals with MS heredity, or individuals with MS, to completely refrain from alcohol,” they also don’t support increasing alcohol consumption, the researchers said.
“Consumption of alcohol has detrimental effects on other disease conditions, and better understanding of the mechanisms behind our findings may help to define ways to achieve protection against MS by other means than alcohol consumption,” they wrote.
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