Originally published February 8 2005
Excessive alcohol consumption may be linked to pneumonia
by Mike Adams, the Health Ranger, NaturalNews Editor
Excessive alcohol consumption is known to have many dangers, but researchers at the University of Aberdeen believe that binge drinking may also contribute to developing pneumonia. Heavy drinking suppresses the cough reflex, which allows bacteria and viruses to grow and develop in the lungs while a drinker is sleeping it off.
Binge drinking will not only give you a pounding headache the next day but, it seems, could also make you more vulnerable to pneumonia.
While pneumonia is most common in the very old and the very young, anyone can catch it.
A study by the University of Aberdeen, published in Respiratory Medicine, found a rise in deaths from 20.4 per 100,000 in 1993-94 to 30.7 in 1999-2000.
Pneumonia is a serious inflammation of the lungs, which become filled with pus and liquid, preventing sufficient oxygen from reaching the blood.
Around 80,000 people in the UK are admitted to hospital with pneumonia each year, and in 2002, the most recent year for which there are figures, 32,000 died from the disease in England and Wales.
The disease is more common in smokers, anyone with a chronic illness such as diabetes and heart, lung and liver disease, or those with weakened immune systems.
When you go to sleep, all the secretions and bacteria lie in the lung and you are more likely to get lung infections.
Excess alcohol suppresses the immune system: if you drink too much you don't eat --- and therefore you don't have a good diet, which harms immunity.
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