Good news: a glass of red can boost gut health

I’VE JUST finished Dry January, and though I did crack a few times, mostly I stuck to it.

Did I feel better? Not really, and now I am again enjoying the occasional glass of red wine, not just for the taste, but because it may be good for my gut microbes.

We’ve known for years that red wine seems to be more beneficial than other forms of alcohol. Take a 2015 study in Israel, where people with type 2 diabetes were asked to drink a medium glass of red wine, white wine or water with their evening meals. After two years the red wine drinkers had significantly improved cholesterol levels and sleep quality; some also had better control of their blood sugar levels.

And this was no fluke — a study in Spain showed that drinking red wine can improve your body’s response to insulin, meaning you can clear sugar from your blood more quickly.

I recently explored this in my podcast series, Just One Thing. I spoke with Tim Spector, a professor of genetics at King’s College London, who led a 2019 study investigating the impact of drinking beer, cider, red wine, white wine or spirits on the gut microbes of nearly 3,000 people — with red wine drinkers having lower rates of obesity and ‘bad’ cholesterol.

Professor Spector says this might be linked to the fact that they also had healthier, more diverse gut microbes. That’s because red wine contains polyphenols, plant compounds that are good for our microbes; red wine has three times more than white wine. But moderation is key: drinking more than a glass or two of red wine regularly means you lose any potential health benefits.