The US Surgeon General has released new advice to spread awareness about alcohol’s link to cancer.
On Friday, Surgeon General Vivek Murthy released a 22-page advisory containing multiple recommendations — among them a call that the surgeon general’s health warning label on alcoholic beverages now includes a cancer risk.
The council claims that a growing body of research over the past four decades has illustrated a link between alcohol consumption and an increased risk of cancer, particularly for breast, colon and rectal, oesophagus, liver, mouth, throat and larynx (voice box).
Alcohol is the third leading cause of preventable cancer in the US, after tobacco and obesity, according to the advisory, but only 45 percent of Americans are aware that alcohol consumption can increase the risk of cancer.
“Alcohol is a well-established preventable cause of cancer responsible for about 100,000 cancer cases and 20,000 cancer deaths annually in the United States — more than 13,500 alcohol-related traffic deaths annually in the U.S.,” Murthy said in press release. “Yet most Americans are unaware of this risk.”
The advisory council’s most prominent recommendation is a proposed change to the surgeon general’s warning label on alcoholic beverages such as beer and wine.
The current label statement — unchanged since it was created in 1988 — only says that pregnant women should not drink alcohol, that alcohol impairs your ability to drive or operate machinery and that it “may cause health problems.”
Despite the new recommendation, only Congress can change the designation.
The council is also calling for a re-evaluation of dietary guidelines for alcohol consumption. The current Dietary Guidelines for Americans recommend a limit of two drinks a day for men and one for women, but a new set of guidelines will be released this year.
The new report also urges people to be aware of the link between alcohol and cancer when considering whether or how much to drink. It encourages public health professionals and community groups to increase education and awareness of this connection.
“It is extremely important that the public know about this advice,” he said Starr Koslov Mautner, MDboard-certified breast surgeon at the Miami Cancer Institute with clinical expertise in surgical breast oncology.
“An ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure,” she said Health“So if this new advice leads to a reduction in alcohol consumption, I think in the next 10 years we will start to see a decline in certain cancers and cancer-related deaths.”
Alcohol has been a known carcinogen since the 1980s, and the council explained several ways in which drinking alcohol can cause cancer.
First, alcohol breaks down in the body into acetaldehyde, a chemical that damages DNA, allowing cells to grow out of control and potentially become cancerous.
Alcohol can also create a harmful condition in the body known as oxidative stress. This damages cells and tissue and can cause a number of health conditions, including cancer.
Although these two processes are best understood, some research also suggests that alcohol can affect hormone levels like estrogen, which can lead to breast cancer, and that drinking alcohol makes it easier for the body to absorb other carcinogens, especially tobacco smoke from cigarettes. . Scientists are still learning more about these mechanisms.
“The relationship appears to be incremental, so the more you drink, the greater the risk,” Mautner said. “For example, the relative risk of breast cancer increases by 7% for every additional 10 grams of alcohol consumed per day.”
However, despite alcohol’s link to cancer, its potential health benefits are still debated.
In the 1980s, red wine began to gain a reputation as a healthy part of the Mediterranean diet. Research has shown that a compound in red wine called resveratrol can reduce the risk of heart disease and cancer.
A study published in European Heart Journal last monthfound a link between light to moderate wine consumption and a lower risk of cardiovascular disease in the elderly.
However, the research only shows an association, not causation. In recent years, health organizations and other research have largely debunked the claim that drinking red wine or any other alcohol is beneficial to health.
“While people used to think that drinking moderate amounts of alcohol was good for you, more recent studies suggest that even moderate amounts of alcohol increase the risk of cancer,” Mautner said. “I advise my patients that alcohol is a toxin and that there is no amount of alcohol that is considered safe.”
Each person’s cancer risk depends on a range of biological and environmental factors, but experts say anyone can reduce their cancer risk by drinking less alcohol, regardless of the type.