BROOKE GLADSTONE 

So we'll pick up and extend Iain Gately's Jekyll and Hyde idea here by observing that since civilization's dawn, we've viewed the transmogrification of grain or the grape as both Mother Nature's miracle elixir and deadly decoction. Our source of creative inspiration and moral impairment, our "hiva." Today, this mercurial relationship often plays out on the news where we learn that red wine will kill us.

 

[CLIP]

 

NEWS REPORT Wine even a little bit of alcohol can actually increase the risk of breast cancer. [END CLIP]

 

BROOKE GLADSTONE Or save us.

 

[CLIP]

 

NEWS REPORT Ladies drink your red wine. It could prevent breast cancer. [END CLIP]

 

BROOKE GLADSTONE Or kill us.

 

[CLIP]

 

NEWS REPORT I probably told you hundreds of times that red wine is good for your heart, but recent news is raising questions. [END CLIP]

 

BROOKE GLADSTONE Or save us.

 

[CLIP]

 

NEWS REPORT It'll help you with good cholesterol. It lowers blood pressure, lowers stress. And overall just, it has many, many health benefits. [END CLIP]

 

BROOKE GLADSTONE Or maybe not?

 

[CLIP]

 

NEWS REPORT Now, it might be good to relax at the end of the day, but it is not good for lowering your blood pressure.

 

BROOKE GLADSTONE Screw it.

 

[CLIP]

 

NEWS REPORT New study suggests that red wine is exercise in a bottle. [END CLIP]

 

BROOKE GLADSTONE That the fruit of the vine, fermented, could actually be medicinal is a tempting yet potentially dangerous conclusion. Robert Taylor, assistant managing editor at Wine Spectator, tracked that notion back to its birthplace, a 60 Minutes special from 1991.

 

ROBERT TAYLOR Well, the 60 Minute piece couldn't have come out at a more perfect time for the wine industry, really. In the 80s, America was obsessed with fitness. I think every house probably had a Jane Fonda VHS tape.

 

[CLIP].

 

JANE FONDA Five, Six, Seven, and Eight again now... [END CLIP]

 

ROBERT TAYLOR ESPN's daytime bread and butter was aerobics shows and weightlifting shows. The 80s were a tough time for wine, especially red wine. Most people drank white wine. A lot of Pinot Grigio,

 

BROOKE GLADSTONE Just 'cause it's easy to drink.

 

ROBERT TAYLOR Sure.

 

BROOKE GLADSTONE It's not so complex or chewy.

 

[BOTH LAUGH]

 

ROBERT TAYLOR Goes down easy.

 

BROOKE GLADSTONE And you also had the rise of Mothers Against Drunk Driving at the time who, you know, were very effective in changing the discussion over alcohol and the safety of children and anyone on the road.

 

ROBERT TAYLOR Absolutely. The Reagan era war on drugs and alcohol had a very significant impact on the culture.

 

BROOKE GLADSTONE So November 1991, this piece airs on 60 Minutes.

 

[CLIP]

 

MORLEY SAFER [BOTTLES CLINK] There has been for years the belief by doctors in many countries that alcohol, in particular red wine, reduces the risk of heart disease. Now it's been all but confirmed. [END CLIP]

 

ROBERT TAYLOR It was viewed by nearly 22 million households. It was really one of 60 Minutes' most popular segments at the time. They revisited it frequently. Morley Safer certainly was enthusiastic about it. He loved red wine. The impact on wine sales in America was immediate. In 1992, red wine sales rose 39 percent in the US.

 

BROOKE GLADSTONE Wow.

 

ROBERT TAYLOR And they maintained that popularity.

 

BROOKE GLADSTONE To this day?

 

ROBERT TAYLOR To this day.

 

BROOKE GLADSTONE Now, some of the assertions in the piece are pretty wild. Like this one.

 

[CLIP]

 

DR SERGE RENEAUX A moderate intake of alcohol prevent heart disease by 50 percent. I mean, this is –.

 

MORLEY SAFER 50 percent?

 

DR SERGE RENEAUX 50 percent. [END CLIP]

 

BROOKE GLADSTONE Who is this guy making these assertions?

 

ROBERT TAYLOR Well, Serge Reneaux was really a maverick at the time. He was a French-Canadian medical researcher and scientist who moved from Bordeaux to Canada at age 20 when he was struck by the incidence of coronary heart disease in North America versus that in France, where people ate so much more fat. You know, the stereotype of the French just eating cheese and butter and foie gras all day long and drinking wine and smoking cigarettes. And yet they had a significantly lower incidence of coronary heart disease.

 

BROOKE GLADSTONE And he came up with the idea of, quote, the French paradox.

 

ROBERT TAYLOR Well, he didn't coin the term, but he is considered the father of the French paradox. And he was the first doctor to examine this relationship and postulate that red wine was the key. And his findings led to a groundswell of scientific research which continues to this day. Decreased the impacts of aging, better heart health. There's so many benefits that have been associated with moderate wine consumption since that time.

 

BROOKE GLADSTONE In the mid 90s, your magazine put a doctor on the cover with the headline Toasting a Long Life.

 

ROBERT TAYLOR We did.

 

BROOKE GLADSTONE So did it seem like the relationship with alcohol in health at that point was settled?

 

ROBERT TAYLOR Settled? I would say that it was beginning to become a reality.

 

BROOKE GLADSTONE We have a wonderful clip from a tribute to Morley Safer after he died given by the Wine Enthusiast.

 

[CLIP]

 

WINE ENTHUSIAST After that story ran, sales of red wine exploded by more than 40 percent jump starting the sale of wine to decades to come. So let's raise a glass in memory of the TV journalist Morley Safer. Yay, he unraveled the French paradox. May you rest in peace. And thank you.

 

ROBERT TAYLOR Morley did a lot for the wine community. He followed up on that 1991 report in 2008 with a report on resveratrol, which really seems to be the most promising of the polyphenols found in wine.

 

BROOKE GLADSTONE Mhmm. The original 60 Minutes piece portrays France as the ideal place where the cultural relationship with wine leads to good health. And I'm wondering, do the French media talk about alcohol in the same way?

 

ROBERT TAYLOR Well, the French media can't.

 

BROOKE GLADSTONE They can't. What do you mean?

 

ROBERT TAYLOR Well, the great irony of what was happening here in the United States in 1991 is that in France, while coronary heart disease rates were low, alcohol related deaths were quite high. Far higher than here in the US, then and now. That's including cirrhosis, liver failure, as well as drunk driving fatalities. In fact, even today in France, there are estimated to be approximately 50,000 alcohol related deaths a year. And that's in a country of 67 million. Here in the US, that number is 88,000 alcohol related deaths, and that's in a country of 323 million. So the instance in France is 1 per about 1300, whereas here in the US it's 1 per about 3600. So in 1991, trying to address these issues in France, they passed what is known as the Evin Law.

 

BROOKE GLADSTONE 1991?

 

ROBERT TAYLOR 1991.

 

BROOKE GLADSTONE The same year that the 60 Minutes piece ran?

 

ROBERT TAYLOR Absolutely. And what that did was prohibit alcohol advertising on television or in film. And it limited how alcohol could be advertised in print. In 2008, it restricted Internet advertising for alcohol.

 

BROOKE GLADSTONE One thing I thought was really fascinating is that advertisers were prohibited from correlating alcohol with happiness or alcohol with sex, and there was a picture of a lovely blond woman with a Mona Lisa smile on her face and a glass of red wine next to her. That's all. She isn't dressed sexy. She isn't lounging over the glass or a bottle or anything. And this was controversial.

 

ROBERT TAYLOR Absolutely.

 

BROOKE GLADSTONE Which suggests in a kind of screwed up way that a pretty woman can't be separated from sex.

 

ROBERT TAYLOR And one of them actually included a smile showing teeth.

 

BROOKE GLADSTONE Was that an issue?

 

ROBERT TAYLOR That was, that was among the issues.

 

[BROOKE LAUGHS]

 

BROOKE GLADSTONE Say you grew up in France under Evin’s Law, and then you show up in the United States. What would strike you about the advertising here?

 

ROBERT TAYLOR To arrive in the US and see advertisements on television of young, healthy, beautiful people having a wonderful, time consuming alcohol – that's 100 percent foreign. Anyone who saw the Super Bowl with the Yellowtail ad, the Australian wine brand with an animatronic kangaroo named Brew and a model and Yellowtail guy and his bright yellow suit.

 

[CLIP]

 

YELLOWTAIL GUY Hi.

 

MODEL Hey.

 

YELLOWTAIL GUY Ugh, wanna pet my 'roo?

 

MODEL Sure, I'll pet your roo.

 

[MUSIC PLAYS UNDER]

 

ROBERT TAYLOR The kangaroo is deejaying at a party. They're enjoying red wine.

 

[MUSIC CONTINUES, CROWD CHEERING].

 

[END CLIP]

 

ROBERT TAYLOR You wouldn't see that in France, you couldn't see that in France.

 

BROOKE GLADSTONE You couldn't see it for beer either.

 

ROBERT TAYLOR No.

 

BROOKE GLADSTONE You can barely turn around in the U.S. without bumping into a beer ad.

 

ROBERT TAYLOR No, which also can't happen in France.

 

BROOKE GLADSTONE You wrote an obituary for Morley Safer when he died in 2016. Nearly 30 years later, do you think the story that he did still influences the way Americans talk about alcohol?

 

ROBERT TAYLOR A hundred percent. I think to this day, people consider a glass or two of red wine a night to be preventative, especially for those at risk for cardiovascular disease.

 

BROOKE GLADSTONE Mm hmm.

 

ROBERT TAYLOR There's evidence now that moderate wine consumption may delay the onset of dementia. The key is moderate. And a lot of the medical community is hesitant to promote wine in this way because they also don't trust us to drink in moderation.

 

BROOKE GLADSTONE That's the nanny state at work.

 

[ROBERT LAUGHS]

 

BROOKE GLADSTONE No, I mean, seriously, why should they?

 

ROBERT TAYLOR Even the cover of Wine Spectator that you mentioned in the mid 90s with the doctor on the cover, looking at it now, I can tell you that the amount of wine in that glass clearly appears to be more than five ounces. That's a bit of an over pour in that glass, and people do have a hard time sticking to the recommended daily dose.

 

BROOKE GLADSTONE Do you happen to know if Evin’s Law has been effective in reducing alcohol related deaths in France?

 

ROBERT TAYLOR I know that it's been very effective in reducing alcohol consumption. In fact, wine consumption in particular has fallen by more than 50 percent in France since 1980. The anti-alcohol movement in France existed well before Evin’s Law. However, per capita consumption in France still dwarfs that of the U.S. In 1980, the French were drinking approximately 80 liters of wine per year per person of drinking age, compared with about seven liters in the US. In the US, that number has been steadily rising up to about 11 liters per year compared with France, which is now down to 40 liters.

 

BROOKE GLADSTONE Still substantial.

 

ROBERT TAYLOR So significant changes in those habits in the U.S. and in France in opposite directions.

 

BROOKE GLADSTONE That is a lot to chew over. I just wish we had a really good Cabernet to go with it.

 

[BOTH CHUCKLE]

 

ROBERT TAYLOR Brooke, that would be day drinking. Not recommended.

 

BROOKE GLADSTONE Thank you so much.

 

ROBERT TAYLOR It's been a pleasure to be here.

 

BROOKE GLADSTONE Robert Taylor is assistant managing editor at Wine Spectator. Coming up, Dr. Nutt's case for solving our alcohol problem once and for all. This is On the Media.

 

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