New research published in the International Journal of Obesity has found that heavy drinkers carry more than 10 per cent extra visceral fat compared to those who drink less.
Unlike subcutaneous fat, which sits beneath the skin's surface and can be prodded, visceral fat wraps around your internal organs.
For their recent study, researchers set out to establish whether alcohol intake actually leads to a rounded middle, or whether it's simply down to excessive food intake.
They analysed data from 5,761 men and women aged 25 to 75, all drawn from the Oxford Biobank – a population-based group designed to reflect the broader UK population.
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The more people drank, the more visceral fat they accumulated
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Rather than relying on simple waist measurements or BMI, which can't tell the difference between harmful visceral fat and the safer subcutaneous kind, researchers used dual-energy X-ray absorptiometry to get precise readings.
Participants filled out questionnaires about their weekly drinking habits, measured in standard units.
The researchers then divided drinkers into groups based on how much they consumed, with the heaviest male drinkers consuming between 17 and 98 units weekly.
The results showed that the more people drank, the more visceral fat they accumulated.
For men in the heaviest drinking group, proportional visceral fat was 13.5 per cent higher than that of those in the lightest drinking category.
Women showed an even steeper jump, with those in the top drinking bracket seeing their proportional visceral fat rise by 17.1 per cent compared to moderate drinkers.
Interestingly, there wasn't much difference between the lower drinking groups – but results were stark in the group of heavy drinkers.
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The data also revealed that as overall body fat increased, heavy drinkers piled on disproportionately more of the dangerous visceral kind.
This type of fat is closely linked to a higher risk of heart disease, type 2 diabetes, and metabolic problems, making it far more worrying than the fat sitting just beneath your skin.
The findings suggest that cutting back on heavy drinking could be worth considering as part of efforts to improve metabolic health.
However, the researchers were careful to point out some limitations.
Cutting back on heavy drinking could improve metabolic health
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Because the study looked at participants at a single point in time and relied on people reporting their own drinking habits, it can't prove that alcohol directly causes visceral fat to build up.
Further long-term studies are needed to confirm that connection.
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