Washington, D.C. — Consumer Federation of America today celebrated the U.S. Surgeon General’s release of a new advisory describing the scientific evidence that alcohol consumption causes at least seven different types of cancer, including breast (in women), colorectum, esophagus, voice box, liver, mouth, and throat. The advisory notes that alcohol is the third leading preventable cause of cancer in the United States, after tobacco and obesity, causing nearly 100,000 cancer cases, and 20,000 deaths, each year. It further notes survey evidence showing that fewer than half of adults are aware that alcohol cause cancer, and recommends that Congress amend the law to provide for a cancer risk warning on alcoholic beverage labels.
The advisory serves up a welcome antidote to decades of alcohol industry misinformation. The World Health Organization’s International Agency for Research on Cancer officially designated alcohol a Class I carcinogen way back in 1987. Yet surveys from organizations such as the National Cancer Institute (NCI) and American Institute for Cancer Research have consistently documented confusion around the relationship between alcohol and cancer. In fact, a 2020 NCI survey showed that 10% of adults think drinking wine decreases cancer risk. Another recent survey of young women found that only 28% were aware that drinking alcohol increases breast cancer risk. Consumer Federation of America and its advocacy partners have emphasized this disconnect in urging federal regulators to act pursuant to the Alcoholic Beverage Labeling Act to include a cancer risk warning.
The Surgeon General’s advisory represents an important step towards updating the law. Under 27 U.S.C. § 217, federal alcohol regulators at the Department of Treasury, “in consultation with the Surgeon General,” have had the duty to notify Congress of the need to update the health warning statement on alcoholic beverages if “available scientific information would justify a change in, addition to, or deletion of the statement.” The Surgeon General’s advisory’s unambiguous endorsement of a cancer warning places the burden on Congress to act now to amend the 1988 warning.
Unfortunately, consumers may have to wait a while for new labels. In recent years, the alcohol industry has proven adept at getting what it wants on Capitol Hill, recently convincing a bipartisan group of congressional representatives to pressure a federal agency to abandon a study on alcohol’s health effects. Moreover, the Trump Administration’s past interference in the 2020 Dietary Guidelines process—rejecting an external scientific advisory committee’s advice to lower the recommended “moderate drinking” limit for men from 2 drinks to 1—suggests the Executive may also be vulnerable to alcohol industry pressure, despite its teetotaler credentials.
State and local governments, however, can act now. In particular, they can mandate alcohol cancer warnings to be posted at point-of-sale, as the Alaska legislature tried to do last year. They can also require cancer warnings on local advertising, including billboards, with the Surgeon General’s advisory undercutting any plausible arguments that such laws would violate alcohol company’s “free speech” rights. Indeed, the advisory should make clear that cancer warnings on alcohol, like those on tobacco, are “purely factual and uncontroversial.”
The Surgeon’s General’s advisory should also inform how the new Dietary Guidelines for Americans (DGAs) address alcohol consumption. As noted in last year’s Scientific Report of the 2025 Dietary Guidelines Advisory Committee (DGAC), two separate scientific reviews on alcohol consumption and health are being conducted to inform the new DGAs on alcohol. One of these, convened by the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine (NASEM) at the behest of the alcohol industry’s congressional allies, has been characterized by a lack of transparency, relevant expertise, and adequate controls on conflicts of interest. The Surgeon General’s advisory will complicate any efforts by that committee to obscure the science, and hopefully lead federal regulators to revise the DGAs to better reflect the 2020 DGAC’s recommendations, i.e.: drinking less, at any level, is better for health.
Contact:
Thomas Gremillion
Consumer Federation of America
tgremillion@consumerfed.org
803-447-6639