🍷 Does alcohol make you blush? Protect your heart!

The facial flushing that sometimes appears after a drink of alcohol, very common in people of East Asian origin, is much more than just a social discomfort. This reaction, called the "Asian flush," is indeed directly linked to myocardial infarction.

Nearly 40% of East Asian individuals (Chinese, Japanese, Taiwanese, and Korean) carry a variation in the ALDH2 gene, responsible for this alcohol intolerance causing rapid and excessive flushing of the face or even the entire body. This mutation is also present in other populations but in much lower proportions.

Beyond these visual effects, this mutation also seems to influence how the heart reacts to acute stress, such as a heart attack, where tissue damage is significant.


A team of researchers, led by Professor Yin Huiyong, described in Circulation how this mutation activates ferroptosis, a specific type of cell death. This process accelerates the degradation of heart tissues during a heart attack, thus providing a biological explanation for clinical observations. Ferroptosis is characterized by an accumulation of lipids and iron, leading to the rapid destruction of heart muscle cells.

A clinical study including 177 Chinese patients confirmed that carriers of the mutation had weaker heart function after a heart attack. Indicators of ferroptosis, such as reduced coenzyme Q10, were higher, indicating increased deleterious cellular activity. These results establish a direct correlation between the genetic variation and the worsening of heart damage.

Experiments on animal models showed that inhibiting ferroptosis improved cardiac recovery after a heart attack. This opens the way for adapting existing treatments. The researchers used genetic and pharmacological methods to confirm these approaches, with positive effects on heart function.