Kim K, Chang Y, Ahn J, et al. - Researchers examined the risk of atrophic gastritis (AG) and intestinal metaplasia (IM) [both are precursor lesions of stomach cancer] in correlation with alcohol consumption among Korean adults (n = 202,675). Participants were free from AG and IM on their initial endoscopy. A mean follow-up of 4.7 years was performed. During the follow-up, experts identified 64,853 incident AG cases and 4,536 IM cases. Findings showed an independent correlation of alcohol consumption, even at low levels, with an increased risk of developing endoscopic AG and IM in this large cohort of Korean people. This revelation supports a role of alcohol intake in the pathogenesis of AG and IM.