In the past, there was a saying among regular drinkers that "alcohol is the 'touchstone' of a person's character." That is, drinking can reflect a person's character and moral character. If a person often shows gaffes, rudeness, or selfish behavior after frequent drinking, he may be perceived by others as lacking in character. However, a growing body of research has found that people who experience this behavior after drinking alcohol not only age faster and have a greater risk of cancer than others, but are also more likely to develop depression.
Photo by Health Times Kou Xiaowen
People who blush after drinking age age faster
In life, many people have red skin after drinking, especially the East Asian population has a particularly high proportion of blushing after drinking. This is mainly due to the defect in the ALDH2 gene in the body, which makes it difficult to effectively convert acetaldehyde, an intermediate product of alcohol metabolism, into non-toxic acetic acid, resulting in the accumulation of acetaldehyde, a toxic substance, causing skin redness. However, don't think that "drunken blushing" is a minor problem, because when aldehydes in the body are not effectively removed, they will react with DNA and proteins in cells, causing multiple forms of DNA damage. In April 2024, a new study published in Nature Cell Biology, a subsidiary of the journal Nature, found a close relationship between DNA damage and aging caused by aldehyde aggregation in the body. ①
Researchers have found through experiments that the accumulation of aldehydes in the body can cause DNA and protein damage, damage to body cells, and more serious symptoms of premature aging. Studies have shown that there is a close relationship between progeria and the accumulation of aldehydes in the body. So, if you are a person who "blushes after drinking", if you drink alcohol for a long time, it may cause you to age faster than others!
People who blush after drinking alcohol have a high risk of cancer
In 2023, Peking University School of Public Health and others published a 12-year study covering more than 512,000 mainland adults in the journal Nature Medicine, revealing that alcohol consumption was positively associated with 61 diseases. And the most notable of the findings is that people who drink alcohol and tend to blush face more prominent health risks. (2) A 2009 study published in the journal PLOS Medicine showed that people who drank alcohol and blushed and drank alcohol often were more likely to develop esophageal cancer, and the risk of esophageal cancer increased by 7-12 times. ③
References (3) A 2020 study published in Science Advances showed that people who drank alcohol and blushed even a small amount of alcohol had a significantly higher risk of stomach cancer, among which alcohol consumption and ALDH2 gene defects are important reasons for the high incidence of gastric cancer in Asian people. ④
Overall, Asians are widely present with ALDH2 gene defects, which cause us to blush easily after drinking alcohol, greatly increasing the risk of digestive cancers. This is mainly caused by the accumulation of acetaldehyde in the body due to a defect in the ALDH2 gene.
People who blush after drinking alcohol are more likely to be depressed
In addition to physical aging and the risk of cancer, mental illness can also find people who blush after drinking. A 2022 study published in the journal Scientific Reports, part of Nature, pointed out the association between blushing after drinking alcohol and depression. The study, which collected data from nearly 140,000 people who drank alcohol, found that more than a third of those people experienced blushing after drinking. People with a current blush reaction had a significantly higher risk of depression than those who had never had a blush reaction. (5) The final study confirmed that the occurrence of depression may be related to the presence or absence of current alcohol flushing.
Photo by Health Times Kou Xiaowen
What should I do if I blush as soon as I drink?
Can I cure my flush when I drink alcohol? Or can I improve it in any way?
Drunken flushing is caused by a mutation in the ALDH2 gene, which triggers the accumulation of acetaldehyde, an intermediate metabolite of alcohol, in the body. Acetaldehyde is a strong vasodilator. When acetaldehyde accumulates in the body, it causes the blood vessels in the face to dilate, causing the skin to turn red.
So, if you are a person who blushes after drinking, it is basically impossible to improve blushing after drinking without changing genes. The best way for people with a flush after drinking is not to drink alcohol. In other words, people who blush after drinking are inherently unfit to drink.
At the same time, acetaldehyde is a class of carcinogens, which plays a central role in alcohol-related carcinogenesis due to the accumulation of acetaldehyde, increasing the risk of cancers such as oropharyngeal cancer, esophageal cancer, and colorectal cancer. It can be said that people who blush after drinking alcohol are more harmful to their bodies than other people who drink alcohol. Therefore, it is recommended that when you eat and drink, if there are people at the table who are blushing after drinking, do not persuade them to drink.
Source: Bailu Video