Article Test

The goal of this work was to elucidate the potential role of “red wine producing background” in the prevention of cardiac mortality. In 20 European countries with the lowest cardiac mortality rates it was found that in South-Europe producing mainly red wines and showing low cardiac mortality rates the type of drinking waters were hard everywhere. This fact could have a greater impact on the good results than the role of red wines. Besides, the higher values of “general domestic product” had a protective role against cardiac mortality in general. In a further study, also on large populations, five Hungarian wine territories were divided in two groups on the basis of similarities in the values of mortality rates, hardness of drinking waters and social backgrounds. Group I: Tokaj and Hódmezővásárhely: with higher cardiac mortality, soft drinking waters and worse social backgrounds; Group II: Szekszárd-Villány, Balaton, Eger: with lower cardiac mortality, hard drinking waters and better social backgrounds. In Group II the white wine producing Balaton region also presented low (good) cardiac mortality rates together with the two red wine producing territories (Szekszárd and Eger), they all had similarly hard drinking waters and good social backgrounds. It could be concluded that the red or white characters of wines produced in these territories did not make any differences in the data of cardiac age-adjusted death rates. On the other hand, the positive roles of similarly hard drinking waters and better social conditions had a greater impact on cardiac prevention than the red or white types of wines produced and supposedly consumed here. In the case of Tokaj, the soft drinking waters plus the worse social backgrounds and not the type of wines involved the bad results. The difference in the red or white types of wines produced in a region seemed negligible in the prevention of cardiac mortality compared to the roles of harder drinking waters and wealthier social backgrounds. Thus, neither the red or white wines were found to be special antidotes for cardiac diseases. However, they will remain crucial parts of the general gastronomic culture of mankind.