At last I know, or think I know, what those units of alcohol are. A unit seems to be 10 grams.
The revelation has been provided by a recent Wine Society newsletter, though it rather coyly doesn't put the matter quite so straightforwardly as I have so I'm not completely sure.
A corollary is that the number of units per glass of wine is usually much higher than 1.
Even for a 125 ml glass, a sixth of a bottle and at one time regarded as the standard, the alcohol content can be as high as 1.8 units, so that even two of those modest glasses would exceed the recommended daily dose.
Alcohol content varies with the type of wine. For whites the driest are the most alcoholic, nearly 11 units per bottle for the 'bone dry' whites, falling to around 7 for the luscious pudding wines I enjoy.
I'd long been puzzled that so many people who like to be thought connoisseurs of wine prefer the very dry sour and bitter wines and are condescendingly disparaging about the delicious sweet ones. Now I have an idea why they behave so oddly; it may be just the alcohol they're after.
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I find it incredible that there is no scientific justification for the recommended number of units stated by the government (or any other government, for that matter). There was an article in the Times some months ago, quoting a doctor who was on the relevant government task force, who said they thought they ought to make some recommendation on the daily limit, and they plucked the number out of the air.
I've found a link here http://www.bmj.com/cgi/content/full/325/7357/191#SEC3
to a report on the effects of alcohol.
It looks as if the recommended levels of consumption may make sense for relatively young people, but that older people, and especially older men, may have a much greater tolerance.
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