Roseto effect: An Italian-American version of the French paradox?

Abstract

Clinicians worldwide continually have to respond to questions about the potential benefits on health from the moderate consumption of alcohol, and the “French paradox” has often been cited as supporting this premise. We wish to briefly comment on findings from the last several decades that provide evidence that moderate drinking may have some beneficial health effects, starting with a new analysis of the observation of “Unusually Low Incidence of Death From Myocardial Infarction” – a study of an Italian American community in Pennsylvania published in the Journal of the American Medical Association in 1964.