I’m a health expert – here’s why beer is good for you and exactly how many pints can reduce the risk of dementia

TWO pints a day help to slash the dementia risk by more than a third, a study reveals.

Experts found teetotallers faced the highest risk of developing the brain-wasting disease after analysing the boozing habits of nearly 25,000 over 60s.

In comparison, people having between one and two drinks a day saw their risk plummet by 38 per cent.

Scientists claim alcohol may protect the heart, which in turn helps to cut risk of dementia.

Another theory is it reduces the build-up of toxic proteins linked to Alzheimer’s.

Writing in the journal Addiction, researcher Dr Louise Mewton from the University of New South Wales, Australia, said: “Drinking up to 40g a day [five units] was associated with a lower risk of dementia when compared with lifetime abstaining.”

A million people in Britain will be living with dementia in just three years’ time.

Despite it being the UK’s biggest single killer, there is still currently no effective treatment to tackle the disease.

Dr Sara Imarisio, Head of Research at Alzheimer’s Research UK, said: “The results showed that people who never drank alcohol had a higher chance of developing dementia than those who did.

“These results are consistent with previous research on this topic, which also show that heavy consumption of alcohol, as well as not drinking, seems linked to a higher risk of dementia.”