- Alcohol is better for you than exercise.
What?
- Is a glass of wine the ticket to a long life?
- [Woman] Would you believe booze beats exercise?
- What?
The news is saying it.
Scientists are saying it.
But am I saying it?
It's time for a Doctor Mike showdown.
Alcohol versus exercise.
Here we go.
(intense drum music)
Gentlemen, we've discussed the rules.
No low blows.
No foul mouths.
No anything.
Defend yourself at all times.
Let's go!
(intense music)
Round one, research.
Who has the edge?
First up is exercise.
There's a lot of quality research
proving that exercise is good for your health.
The way they do this is they take a bunch of people
that are very similar
and they break them up into two groups.
One group is told not to exercise,
and the other group is told to exercise.
What they find is, consistently,
that people who exercise have more health benefits.
(whistle blows)
That proves causation.
Next up, we have alcohol.
Also, a ton of research linking it to health benefits.
But, it's a different type of research.
What these types of studies do, is they take a person
and they look back in their lives
and they try and tie some of the lifestyle habits
to current health outcomes.
That's called an observational trial.
These do not prove causation.
No causation.
(whistle blows)
No causation!
To win the research round, you need causation.
Round one goes to exercise, because causation.
(whistle blows)
Well everybody that was a hard fought round,
exercise came in strong
with the low blow from the causation.
But correlation and alcohol really stayed in there,
tough and true to it's nature.
I don't think we can count alcohol out just yet.
Round two.
Accessibility.
Which one of these is more straight forward
to get the health benefits?
First up, we have alcohol.
Most studies say that you need a glass a day
if you're a woman,
or two glasses a day if you're a man,
to reap the health benefits.
So all you have to do is this?
(wine pouring)
Pretty accessible, I'd say.
Next up, we have the leading contender, exercise.
And it can get a little confusing.
They say you have to do exactly 150 minutes
of moderate intensity exercise a week,
or 75 minutes a week of vigorous intensity exercise.
But what's moderate intensity exercise?
Is this moderate intensity exercise?!
Is this moderate intensity?
Oh!
I fell off the thing and I was killing my knee.
(whistle blows)
Round two goes to alcohol.
It's a technical decision,
but it is easier to drink a glass of alcohol
than it is to figure out
what moderate intensity exercise is.
Is this moderate intensity exercise?
After a nail biting round two,
alcohol takes a point away from exercise.
What an amazing round, but it's a technical win for alcohol.
Round three, extremes.
You can overdo it with either one of these.
But which is less harmful to your health?
(whistle blows)
First up, we have exercise.
And yes, you can totally overdo it
when it comes to exercise.
Go too extreme, go too hardcore,
and your body can break down.
Muscle damage.
Rhabdomyolysis.
Heart arrhythmias.
Early onset osteoarthritis.
Knee injuries.
Tendon injuries.
Shoulder injuries.
And have we forgotten?
Concussions.
These things can happen.
Next up, we have alcohol.
Very easy to overdo it with alcohol.
Some of you say, one drink per day per week?
That's seven drinks.
I can have that in one sitting.
Nope, that's considered binge drinking.
And binge drinking has
a lot of harmful effects on your health.
You're talking about car crashes.
Unplanned pregnancies.
STDs.
Fetal alcohol syndrome.
Alcohol poisoning.
Alcoholism.
Suicide.
Homicide.
Cancer.
Should I go one?
I don't think so.
Results of round three, the harms of extreme drinking
far outweigh the harms of extreme exercise.
(whistle blows)
But this is a showdown for health benefits.
No points awarded.
After round three, I don't know what's going on.
The judge is saying he only wants benefits.
He said harms, but he wants benefits.
I don't know what's going on.
We're going in to round four.
The championship round.
The universal recommendation.
If I had to recommend one of these things to my patient,
which would it be?
Alcohol.
I'll put it to you this way.
A lot of weak evidence
that's more correlation than causation.
And very easy to overdo it on.
But if someone's already
drinking alcohol in moderation?
Mmm, not so bad.
Exercise.
While technically you can overdo it
and do too much exercise, it's highly unlikely.
And yes, it can get confusing to figure out
what constitutes proper exercise.
The most important part here is that exercise
has tremendous amount of health benefits,
and they are proven because of causation.
At the end of round four,
I'm gonna have to give the point to exercise.
It's something I'm comfortable universally recommending
to almost every single patient.
As opposed to alcohol which isn't so clear
on it's benefits and has serious harms.
So after four rounds of immense action,
the winner by unanimous decision is, exercise.
(crowd cheers)
We've officially crowed a winner.
Exercise has dominated alcohol
in this phenomenal display of skill.
This is one for the ages, ladies and gentlemen.
Oh my god, and the winner's here with us.
Tell us how you feel, exercise!
There you have it.
A champion of a few words.
That's how we loved him.
Back to you, Doctor Mike.
(cheerful music)
Alright, I know that was a little crazy,
but I had to do it.
When I heard this wild claim
that came from a lot of these headlines,
I knew I had to address it in a funky way.
And this was my first time
doing something as wild as this,
so first off, I hope you enjoyed it.
Yes, there was a correlation between those who drank alcohol
and those who live longer.
And maybe was more of a correlation
than exercise and long life.
But it doesn't mean that there was proof that alcohol
is the reason for this longevity.
Here's my bottom line.
If you're of legal age,
drink in moderation because it brings you joy.
Not because you think it'll give you a healthier life.
And when it comes to exercise, within reason,
any exercise is better than none.
But excessive exercise isn't better than some.
Alcohol is a very addictive substance.
I've treated many patients
that have problems with alcohol addiction,
and it's very difficult to stop
once you've already begun drinking often,
regretting that you're drinking.
I really want you to seek help
if you believe you have a problem,
or if your friends have told you that you have a problem.
I'm putting into the description box,
a website and a phone number that you can call to get help,
because support is out there.
This is a problem you should address head on.
The first step is to identify the problem.
And second is to take action.
You have all the links,
you have all the phone numbers below.
Get help if you need it.
Thank you so much for watching.
I know this has been a very unique video
and it's a new concept I'm trying out.
So if you enjoyed it, please give this video a like
and comment down below what was your favorite part.
As always, stay happy and healthy.
You know what that means, it's time for (laughs).
Is this moderate intensity? (laughs)
Is this (laughs) I can't do it.
Is this moderate intensity?
Rhabdomyolysis.
Early onset...
No points awarded! (laughs)
What would I tell a random patient
walking through my door to do one of these things, yeah.
Choose one of these as a recommendation for my patient
I'll be rapping about the nation.
Is this moderation?!
Exercise.
(breathes deeply)
(upbeat music)