Lead image for Before your next drink: Here's what alcohol does to your body.
It's the weekend, and by now someone in the group chat has typed "one for the road." Everyone knows exactly what that means.
What most people don't think about is what happens once that alcoholic drink actually gets into the bloodstream, or whether it even matters if it came from a proper factory or a backstreet brewer.
We asked Dr Wahome Joseph, a toxicologist, to explain what alcohol really does inside the body, and why some of it doesn't leave without doing damage on the way out.
What happens in the body when a person drinks alcohol?
First, the liver takes it on. But before it gets broken down any further, alcohol reaches the central nervous system, and that's where things start, with a bit of stimulation or excitement, before it eventually tips over into depression.
Alcohol is, at the end of the day, a drug, and its reach goes further than most people assume.
Too much of it and the gut pays the price, which explains the vomiting and the stomach pain that often follow. It draws water out of the body as well, which is exactly why it is important to always rehydrate after consuming alcohol.