If red wine protects against heart disease, it’s probably not because of the antioxidants that the drink contains, two new studies in mice suggest.
Many scientists presume that oxidation of low-density lipoprotein cholesterol—bad cholesterol—is a major cause of atherosclerosis, the fatty plaques that can accumulate inside the arteries around the heart.
Therefore, an often-proposed explanation of red wine’s protective effects has been its abundant supply of the antioxidants called polyphenols.
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