Wine and Health Survey

morefocus recently surveyed people's opinions on wine consumption and health. Nearly 2,800 voiced their feelings on what moderation is, how much they consume, and how knowledge of wine's health benefits has altered their consumption. Overwhelmingly, 94 percent of respondents agreed that moderate consumption of red wine is beneficial to health.

In general, people's perception of "moderate" drinking fell in line with their own consumption practices. While most respondents (56 percent) defined moderation as two glasses of wine per day, 61 percent drink at most one glass of wine per day. Although less people tended to define three glasses of wine as moderate, the question about how much people consume listed a range of two to three glasses. Therefore, it is hard to say whether this smaller group who chose the two to three range tends to drink within their concept of moderation or exceed it.

Findings of current research have an enormous impact on people's consumption patterns. 94 percent of respondents said they would drink more red wine knowing that it can prevent heart disease. Conversely, only 6 percent would continue drinking more white then red wine.

Many people (43 percent) related that they would like to see guidelines for healthy consumption on wine labels. Although the majority of respondents agreed on their concept of "moderate" drinking as two glasses daily, ironically peoples' initial response is to not trust others' concepts of "healthy consumption" and, thus, desire guidelines on wine labels. Nevertheless, 34 percent of respondents agreed that nothing should be done to labels, reaffirming faith in the fact that individual concepts of "healthy consumption" most likely will, and in fact already do, fall within a general consensus of "moderation."

This survey on wine and health found that most respondents not only agreed that red wine has health benefits, but they also shared their concept of "moderate" drinking and tended to consume wine according to this notion.