We have long been told that a glass of red wine is good for our health, but an increasing number of clinical studies show that beer can have even greater benefits.
“Beer has a bad image – it is more often associated with drunken football crowds than health-conscious, discerning drinkers,” says George Philliskirk of the Institute of Brewing and Distillery, who specialises in yeast research. “But when drunk in moderation, it provides a wider range of health benefits than wine.”
“It need not be an expensive beer, just don’t drink so much you cancel out the benefits, he says. “This means no more than a pint (568ml) a day for a woman and between one and two pints, depending on its strength, for a man.”
Glass for glass, he says, “beer is less calorific than wine. It is the lifestyle that gives a beer drinker a belly, not the drinking itself.
“Although the volume of beer consumed is generally more than wine, if you limit yourself to a pint a day you are consuming only a few more calories than if you drank a large glass of wine.”
Beer contains about 750 kilojoules a pint, while a large glass (250ml) of red wine contains 670kJ and 630kJ in white.
A single pint of beer is more effective at rehydrating the body than the equivalent amount of water, a study at the University of Granada in Spain has shown.
Philliskirk says a pint of beer could provide about 10 percent of the recommended daily intake of some B vitamins. – Daily Mail