Heavy drinking doesn’t just damage your liver. New research says it may also shrink your brain, impair memory, and take years off your life. A recent study has drawn a compelling connection between long-term alcohol use and brain lesions linked to cognitive decline and earlier mortality.
The research was led by scientists at the University of São Paulo and published in the journal Neurology. In it, the researchers analyzed brain autopsies from nearly 1,800 individuals. These were matched with data from the UK Biobank, allowing the researchers to compare alcohol habits with neurological health at death.
The autopsies were grouped into four categories: lifelong non-drinkers, moderate drinkers, former heavy drinkers, and heavy drinkers who continued drinking until the end of their lives.
Based on the findings, heavy alcohol consumption appears to cause brain damage, with drinking strongly associated with hyaline arteriolosclerosis. This is a condition where the brain’s small blood vessels become stiff and narrow, reducing blood flow and increasing the risk of damage over time.
The researchers say that this vascular change is known to impair memory and thinking skills. So, its association here only further solidifies the link between alcohol consumption, brain damage, and long-term cognitive decline.
What’s more troubling is that even those who stopped drinking before death still showed heightened risks of brain lesions and neurological degeneration. The damage doesn’t simply disappear once the drinking stops.
Former heavy drinkers were more likely to show tau tangles in the brain—a protein associated with Alzheimer’s disease and other forms of dementia. They also tended to have smaller brains relative to body size and scored lower on cognitive tests.
Perhaps the most sobering statistic of all, though, is that heavy drinkers had an average lifespan 13 years shorter than those who never drank. While the study doesn’t claim causation outright, the data makes a strong case for rethinking what we know about alcohol’s long-term effects on the brain, further backing the belief that even moderate drinking may be harmful.
Researchers acknowledge there are some limitations here, of course, particularly that they couldn’t determine precisely how long subjects had been drinking. Still, the evidence adds to a growing understanding that alcohol-induced brain damage is real, and it may begin well before any symptoms become obvious.
