It's not sort of current news but I've just found a few links of some interest on the Internet.
So, once my teacher of English who was a doctor from the state of Oklahoma specialiasing in cardiovascular surgery told me that if one drinks 50 grams of strong beverage daily they are likely to have blood vessels in good state even when they are old. I did a search on the Internet and found a couple of links giving some infomation related to positive effects of moderate consumption of alcohol.
The first one is sort of FAQ: http://www2.potsdam.edu/hansondj/AlcoholAndHealth.html
The second one (http://circ.ahajournals.org/cgi/content/full/94/11/3023) is more surprising. It claims that if there were no consumption of alcohol in the USA it would save 100000 lives yearly of those who are younger than 45 and result in additional 80000 deaths among those who are older than 45.

