Drinking even moderate amounts of alcohol will shave years off your life, according to an extensive international study that shows Australian guidelines are far too lax.

Indulging in more than 10 standard drinks – or six glasses of wine or cans of beer – a week, reduces your life expectancy, the study published in the Lancet has revealed.

The study was wide-ranging, involving 120 co-authors and close to 600,000 participants in 83 surveys from 19-high income countries.

The study recommended a hard-line threshold of 100 grams of pure alcohol per week, with any more than that beginning to affect longevity.

A 40-year-old man was estimated to lose one to two years off his life by consuming 196 grams of pure alcohol, instead of the recommended 10 standard drinks or 100-grams-per-week threshold.

University of Western Australia Professor Bu Yeap, a co-author of the study, said it was a “suitable time” for current Australian guidelines on alcohol consumption to be reviewed so that the new information could be considered.

The Australian guidelines published in 2009 are almost a decade old and recommend “healthy men and women” drink no more than two standard drinks on any day to reduce the lifetime risk of harm from alcohol-related disease or injury.

A standard drink refers to 10 grams of pure alcohol, but a serving of alcohol usually differs from a “standard” drink. The Australian guidelines suggest a full-strength can or stubby of 375 millilitres of beer or a restaurant serving of 150 millilitres of white wine is 1.4 standard drinks.

“An important message from this study is that optimal life expectancy is associated with a relatively low level of alcohol consumption – less than 100 grams per week – and that higher levels of consumption increase mortality risk,” Professor Yeap said.

The study’s recommendation of 100 grams is also far less than national alcohol consumption recommendations around the world.

Recommended alcohol limits in Italy, Portugal and Spain are almost 50 per cent higher than the 100 grams per week limit, and in the USA, the upper limit for men is near 196 grams per week or 11 glasses and 98 grams per week for women.

Another point of difference from these recommendations, is the study’s universal threshold for a “minimum mortality risk” that doesn’t discriminate between genders.

Australian Medical Association vice-president Dr Tony Bartone told The New Daily the findings were a “wake-up call” for drinkers to consume no more than one-and-a-half standard drinks a day.

Dr Bartone said all studies showed there was no “safe level” of alcohol consumption, and European health agencies have long been advocating to keep drinking to a minimum, as it is a contributing factor to a number of cancers, liver disease and all forms of heart disease and stroke.

He also noted it was important to remember the study focussed on mortality rates, not quality of life.

“This isn’t saying anything about the quality of life, the disease burden that happens along the way,” Dr Bartone said.