Hungover? Look on the Bright Side: Drinking Alcohol Doesn't Kill Brain Cells

By Daven Hiskey on at



Various other research since has backed up Jensen's findings. Thus, even alcoholics who are continually taking in unhealthy amounts of alcohol aren't going to see brain cells die because of their drinking problem. However, alcohol does have other effects on the brain, both positive and negative, that have nothing to do with brain cells dying.

First, the positive: drinking moderate amounts of alcohol on a regular basis has been shown to have various positive effects on your body. The one that pertains to this article's topic is that it has been shown to help protect people from cognitive impairment as they age. According to a study done at the Catholic University of the Sacred Heart, in Italy, 29 per cent of people 65 years or older who almost never drank alcohol throughout their life had mental impairment issues. On the flip-side of that, only about 19 per cent of people 65 years or older who drank moderate amounts of alcohol regularly had any mental impairment.


Now for the negative (there's a lot when it comes to intemperate alcohol consumption, so I'll only cover a few): while brain cells aren't being killed as the result of drinking excessive amounts of alcohol, the ability for your brain cells to communicate with one another is being inhibited. What's going on here is that the alcohol ends up damaging dendrites, which are the things at the ends of neurons that conduct electrochemical stimulation from another cell to the cell body in question. Basically, with some of these dendrites damaged, it inhibits the ability of your brain cells to talk to one another.


Unfortunately, for the people who have an extreme habit of excessively drinking, there are other side effects on your brain that aren't so easily completely fixed, such as developing Wernicke-Korsakoff syndrome, which is characterised by: confusion, coordination problems, hallucinations, memory problems, eye problems, and even inducing a coma or death, if it's left untreated. What's going on here is that excessive alcohol consumption over a long period of time causes a vitamin B1 deficiency (8 out of 10 alcoholics are vitamin B1 deficient), due to the alcohol inhibiting the body's ability to absorb thiamine (also many alcoholics are often malnourished because of their own bad eating habits). This, in turn, causes neuron death, among other things. This is treatable, in most cases, but certain effects stick around forever as your body won't be able to repair itself completely from this particular brand of damage.



Bottom line, alcohol consumed in moderation, such as a small glass of wine a day, can be very good for you. On the other hand, drinking excessively won't kill you brain cells directly, but is still bad for your brain. Although, your body can compensate, to a certain extent, and repair the damage caused in most cases, at least as far as your brain is concerned, so long as you don't make a regular habit of it.

Bonus Facts

--Another myth concerning alcohol that was once spread about, but to which I don't think anyone actually believes anymore (at least I hope not!), is that drinking excessive amounts of alcohol can lead to spontaneous combustion due to alcohol being flammable and it coursing through your veins. This is ridiculous on many levels, but nevertheless, was a popular notion during the US Prohibition and for a while afterwards. The myth that alcohol kills brain cells was also widely popularised around that time.
--There are several things that contribute to hangovers, but principally what's going on here is simple dehydration. Alcohol has a dehydrating effect by inhibiting the release of vasopressin, which is an anti-diuretic hormone. So in layman's terms, the result of alcohol inhibiting the vasopressin is that your body produces a lot more urine than normal with the result that you become dehydrated easily.
--Scientists once believed that the number of nerve cells you have in your brain, once you reach adulthood, was all you'd ever have. Thus, damaging these cells could be extremely detrimental to the individual. However, this isn't correct. New neurons are created all the time in the adult brain, in a process that is called neurogenesis.

Image: Shutterstock/Sergey Nivens


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