No Increased Risk of Cancer Death from Moderate Alcohol Consumption: Study
It is the role and responsibility of public health institutions to evaluate the evidence and make recommendations based on the preponderance of the evidence. Because we are talking about the health of human beings here, there is naturally a tendency to be conservative in declarations about public health.
This most basic principle in part explains the hysterical claims that there is no safe level of alcohol consumption and, particularly, that the risks of cancer associated with alcohol consumption are such that even moderate consumption of alcohol ought to be avoided.
But what happens when reliable, well-conducted studies show not only that this claimed association between moderate alcohol consumption actually doesn’t exist, but also that moderate consumption of alcohol is associated with a LOWER risk of cancer than abstention from drinking? What kind of deliberations occur within the various bodies and institutions that claim controls (such as warning labels concerning alcohol and cancer) ought to be instituted to prevent cancer due to alcohol consumption, when all of a sudden, new studies show the actual association is a LOWER risk of cancer from moderate alcohol consumption.
A new study was released with the title, “Reevaluating the Alcohol–Cancer Link: Long-Term Cancer Mortality Outcomes in the REGARDS Study“. The study looked at 26,694 participants, with a mean age of 64, and followed them over 13 years with particular attention paid to their level of alcohol consumption and whether they contracted cancer during that time.
Read the study’s results carefully:
So, what does this mean for the drive to eradicate access to alcohol, to increase the cost of alcohol, and to place huge, scary warning labels on alcohol that warn you will die if you take a sip?
We get a hint of what this means by reading the conclusion the authors of this study provide:
“While light-to-moderate drinking may appear neutral or even protective in certain analyses, we caution against interpreting alcohol consumption as beneficial for cancer outcomes. Instead, our study reinforces public health recommendations to limit alcohol intake, and emphasizes the need to address co-occurring risk factors, especially tobacco use, to reduce cancer mortality. Importantly, we encourage strategies to step away from isolating a single lifestyle factor or health behavior and consider more holistic, comprehensive perspectives on an individual’s behaviors including physical activity, smoking, diet, and alcohol consumption.”
Let me translate that: Turn away. Do not look at our findings that light to moderate consumption of alcohol appears to have a protective effect on cancer rates. Limit alcohol consumption anyway. Oh, and you (I’m looking at you World Health Organization) might want to consider taking a less hyperbolic and hysterical approach to warnings about alcohol and cancer and focus instead on a variety of lifestyle factors: SMOKING-SMOKING-SMOKING!
Even the authors of this study decided to bury the lede, that low to moderate amounts of alcohol consumption is associated with lower rates of cancer. Even the authors of the study. felt compelled to warn that all people should “limit” their alcohol consumption. However, it was nice of the authors to make the smallest possible pivot toward warning organizations away from making declarations about cancer based solely on associations with alcohol and not include other confounding factors, such as smoking and obesity, in their analysis. The authors of this new study did the very least they could to address their study’s ultimate meaning: The WHO’s declaration on alcohol and cancer is full of shit and the result of an ideologically captured institution unable to see things rationally.
This is one of those studies that those concerned with the direction of public health vis-à-vis alcohol consumption should save and be ready to cite anytime the issue of alcohol and cancer is raised. They should be ready to deliver the study’s money quote:
This is also something that those who are concerned that the media is mindlessly citing the idea that alcohol causes cancer (and there are NUMEROUS examples of this) should be ready to prop down in the article’s comment section or shoot off to the article’s author via email.
But here’s an interesting twist. This study does not go into the impact on cancer mortality based on the type of alcohol that is consumed. However, another recent study did just this and found the following:
“Differences in risk by alcohol type emerged at low and moderate levels of consumption, where drinking spirits, beer or cider was associated with a significantly higher risk of death while the same level of wine consumption was associated with a significantly lower risk of death.”
It’s almost as though there ought to be an organization dedicated to promoting balanced and accurate representations of alcohol consumption in the media; an organization that could quickly push back against articles that mindlessly repeat the absurd World Health Organization’s claims about no safe level of alcohol consumption or the notion that moderate alcohol consumption causes cancer.
This study, showing lower rates of cancer mortality for light drinkers and no association with cancer mortality among moderate drinkers, was published in May by the Journal of General Internal Medicine. The study was led by Laura C. Pinheiro PhD, an experienced and well-published cancer researcher at Cornell. Not a peep about it in the media. Zero. Nothing.
Why? Because no one covering this issue in the media was told about the study, and because even if they were, they would be forced to contradict their previous reporting on it. No one wants to have to publish, “whoops”.
But again, this is why there needs to be an organization with the sole purpose of pushing out these studies far and wide, delivering the study to media who mindlessly quote anti-alcohol advocates, and giving others concerned with alcohol accuracy in the Media (AAIM) tools to push back against the deceptive move to restrict alcohol marketing, to increasae alcohol prices, to restrict access to alcohol, and to bar the alcohol industry from participating in government alcohol policy creation.
Tom Wark is the publisher of FERMENTATION, a source of commentary on the wine business that he has written since 2004. He is also the publisher of THE SPILL, a free, daily newsletter that curates the best wine content on the web. SUBSCRIBE TO THE SPILL FOR FREE.
