The French Paradox

Yesterday, after boasting about how unique our class is and making my friend rethink his economics major while he reads classic economics textbooks and I read American Wine Economics, he said, “our bodies are not meant to process alcohol. It is poison, even wine.” A few hours later, James Thornton brought to my attention the historic health benefit investigations of red wine. 

In 1991, a 60 Minutes episode aired exploring the health benefits of red wine, specifically highlighting the longer lifespan of the French who smoked more, exercised less, and consumed more red meat than Americans. After The French Paradox aired, demand for red wine, particularly Merlot, surged, replacing the previously popular White Zinfandel. In turn, Merlot prices increased, demand and subsequently prices for White Zinfandel decreased, and most impressively, sales of red wine jumped 39% in the U.S.. Out of this craze sprang some diets that required consumption of red wine. 

Not one to follow health fads and rather skeptical of overzealous food recommendations, I read some peer-reviewed journal articles on red wine nutrition and health benefits. While I was looking with a biased eye to justify my own consumption and to refute the “poison” comment, it is widely cited that red wine prevents chronic diseases. The antioxidants from grapes, particularly polyphenols, have been widely studied for their effect on reducing the risk of cardiovascular diseases and some cancers (wine can reduce cancer risk since the antioxidants ‘scavenge’ to reduce free radical reactivity). I hypothesize that red wine has greater health benefits than white wine given that the polyphenols are derived from the grape skins. Though, there are some techniques winemakers can use to extract additional polyphenols from grape skins when producing white wine with comparable polyphenol levels to red wine (if perceived wine nutrition/healthiness is valued by the winemaker). 

What is most interesting to me from this exploration is not just the actual health benefits of wine, but rather, how dramatically perceptions of wine health benefits influence consumption and sales. For red wine sales to jump a whole 39% in one year? Should we be more impressed by the impact health data has on consumer behavior or by the power of 60 Minutes? This post has me wondering: has the wine industry ever had comparable health research scandals or backlash parallel to that of the meat industry? Have wines ever been targeted in the debate over whether sugar or fat is to blame for weight gain and health crises? Has the wine industry even funded a comparable study to boost their sales as have many other “vice” industries?

Sources:

Contribution of Red Wine Consumption to Human Health Protection. (2018). Link: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6099584/

Thornton, James. American Wine Economics. 

The French Paradox (shorter video): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=njm1LkXP2sg

The French Paradox: Lessons for other countries. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1768013/

Note: If you look up ‘French Paradox’ or ‘red wine health benefits’, you’ll get a ton of pro-wine papers and a number of French-Paradox-Diet-Debunked style papers as well.