Wine is No Panacea

I have my own misgivings about the "health benefits" provided by red wine based on my own experiences in graduate school. I remember discovering that abiotic stress does not significantly increase resveratrol deposition in berries (and hence in the wine) but that significant rises in ethyl carbamates (carcinogens) were detected. It's nice to see someone else punch holes in the research.

The University of Washington has a viticulture program. I was myself surprised a decade ago to learn this. I suppose the eastern portion of the state is much like Nevada's high desert, so I shouldn't have been surprised. In any case, researchers there found that Resveratrol supplements do not seem to show a significant health benefit. The researcher diplomatically concluded that wine must be healthy because resveratrol comes in a cocktail of other secondary metabolites. Very shrewd.

Simply hypothesized, plants do not make things because they are beneficial to us. Despite the supposition that plants are somehow altruistic in their support of humans, it's not necessarily on purpose. That would require sentience. Plants make them because these compounds like resveratrol help them survive. They also help us, but that's a coincidence of chemical compatibility (or evolutionary adaptation to be able to use them) more than it's an active effort on behalf of fruit to help humans. If resveratrol also helps us, that's a happy accident, but he's probably right- it works because it's coupled to other things.

The trouble is, it's also in there with things that are bad for you.

So, do the costs outweigh the benefits? That depends on whom you ask.