Metabolic syndrome - the cluster of symptoms such as obesity and high blood pressure that can lead to diabetes and heart disease - seems to be less frequent among people who consume moderate amounts of alcohol, a new study suggests.

Dr. Matthew S. Freiberg, from Boston Medical Center, and colleagues analyzed data for 8125 subjects in the Third National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey.

The participants were evaluated for their alcohol consumption and for each component of the metabolic syndrome - that is, having a large waist, high blood pressure, high blood glucose levels, high triglyceride levels and low “good” HDL cholesterol levels.

Overall, 60 percent of the subjects were current drinkers, defined as having at least one alcoholic drink per month. The percentages were higher for men (66 percent) than for women (50 percent), the team reports in the medical journal Diabetes Care.

The metabolic syndrome was seen slightly more often among women (23 percent) than among men (22 percent).

Overall, the researchers found that current drinkers had a 43 percent lower likelihood of having the metabolic syndrome than did non-drinkers.

After taking into account “age, sex, race/ethnicity, education, income, tobacco use, physical activity, and diet,” the investigators calculated that participants who consumed 1-19 drinks of alcohol per month had a reduction in risk of 35 percent, and those who took more than 20 drinks a month had a 66 percent lower risk of the metabolic syndrome.

However, the benefit seemed to come from drinking beer and wine only, not liquor.

Alcohol consumption seemed to improve three components of the metabolic syndrome in particular: low HDL cholesterol, elevated triglycerides, and high waist circumference.

SOURCE: Diabetes Care, December 2004.