As part of strict new alcohol guidelines, Americans may be officially urged to drink no more than two beers a week.
Mr Biden’s health minister told DailyMail.com that the USDA may revise its recommendations on alcohol, similar to Canada’s recommendation to drink no more than two drinks a week.
Dr. George Cove, who admits to enjoying a few glasses of Chardonnay a week, said he’s been following Canada’s “great experiment” with interest.
“I think people will start to re-evaluate where we are if there are health benefits.” [in the US]” he told DailyMail.com.
Current U.S. recommendations limit women to one beer, one small glass of wine, or one shot of spirits per day, and men to two.
However, these guidelines will be reviewed in 2025.
According to US guidelines, a drink is defined as containing 0.6 fluid ounces of alcohol, which is equivalent to one glass of beer, one glass of 12 percent alcoholic wine, or one shot.
Asked in what direction the guidelines could change, Dr. George Kove, director of the National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism (NIAAA) said, “I mean, the guidelines will not go up. I am confident,” he said.
“So if [alcohol consumption guidelines] Whichever direction you go, it’s the Canadian direction. ”
This guideline is currently under review, and an updated version may not be published until the end of 2025.
The debate over whether small amounts of alcohol are good for you has been going on for decades, but a growing body of research shows that even small amounts can be detrimental to your health.
A large study in June this year warned that any amount of alcohol consumption increases the risk of 60 diseases, including 33 previously unrelated to alcohol. include.
Cirrhosis (scarring caused by continuous and long-term liver damage), stroke and cancer are well-established risks from excessive alcohol consumption.
But an Oxford University-led study that analyzed data from half a million men in China also linked it to other ailments, such as gout and cataracts.
Dr. Cove told DailyMail.com that there is “no benefit” to drinking alcohol in terms of physical health.
“We feel that most of the benefits people get from alcohol really have more to do with what they eat than what they drink,” he said.
“So it has something to do with the Mediterranean diet and socioeconomic status, you can afford that diet, you can make your own fresh food and so on.
“With this in mind, most of the health benefits are lost.”
However, he described alcohol as “the lubricant of society” and gave grounds to social good.
Dr. Cove said he consumes about two glasses of white wine a week, usually a “buttery California chardonnay.”
Canadian health officials have admitted that the new rules, announced earlier this year, may be “a bit shocking”.
The review process for the 2025-2030 Dietary Guidelines for Americans has already begun, but the final version may not be published until the end of 2025.
Since the 1990s, the United States has recommended a safe limit of two drinks per day for adult men and one drink per day for women.
Previous studies have linked resveratrol in red wine to reduced cancer risk and improved heart health, suggesting that drinking alcohol may have some benefits. I was.
In recent years, research has gone in the opposite direction, warning that even small amounts of alcohol can be dangerous to your health.
a Reports released in 2020 A federal panel of experts has warned that drinking increases the risk of cancer and said the limit should be reduced to one drink a day.
and, 2021 report Researchers from the American Cancer Society warned that alcohol is involved in 1 in 20 cancer cases in the United States, or 25,000 each year.
They found that alcohol increases the risk of both rarer cancers, such as throat cancer, and more common cancers, such as breast cancer, which is most common in women.
more recent research A study of 370,000 people warned that drinking more alcohol increased the risk of heart disease by 1.4 times.
Government authorities, including the World Health Organization, have used the findings to warn that even small amounts of alcohol can put your health at risk.
As a result of this growing body of evidence, and an independent analysis of 6,000 studies, Canadian health officials earlier this year overturned drinking guidelines, limiting drinking to two drinks per week.
Previously, they suggested women could drink up to 10 drinks a week and men up to 15. This is similar to the limits set in the United States.
But the move was quickly criticized by some, who accused authorities of “ignoring” the benefits of drinking, including how it can help combat social situations and loneliness.
“Alcohol has many positive effects on many lives,” said Dr. Dan Malek, a health science expert at Brock University in Canada.
“We celebrate achievements, mark occasions, bring wine to parties, meet friends, care, relax, de-stress…these are important activities that many textures and It’s part of the tone.”
Experts have long argued that research on alcohol’s risks is flawed because it fails to consider these social benefits.