Inverse graded relation between alcohol consumption and active infection with Helicobacter pylori

Alcoholic beverages are known to have strong antibacterial activity. It is unclear, however, to what degree their consumption affects colonization of the human stomach with the bacterium Helicobacter pylori, a risk factor of various chronic diseases. The authors assessed the relation between alcohol consumption and active infection with H. pylori in a cross-sectional study among employees of a health insurance company and their household members (n = 425) in southern Germany. Quantitative information on alcohol consumption by beverage type and other factors that were known or suspected to be related to infection status was collected by a standardized questionnaire, and active infection was measured by the 13C-urea breath test. After control for confounding factors, there was a monotonic inverse graded relation between alcohol consumption and H. pylori infection (p for trend = 0.017). The odds ratio of infection among subjects who consumed more than 75 g of alcohol per week compared with subjects who did not drink alcohol was 0.31 (95 percent confidence interval 0.12-0.81). The inverse relation with H. pylori infection was stronger for alcohol consumed in the form of wine than for alcohol from beer. Notwithstanding its cross-sectional design, this study seems to support the hypothesis that alcohol consumption, particularly wine consumption, may reduce the odds of active infection with H. pylori.