Uncle Sam has long advised Americans to stick to one (for women) or two (men) drinks a day. But as sources tell Reuters, the Department of Health and Human Services looks poised to chuck that advice in what would be a huge coup for the alcohol industry courtesy of Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr., himself a nondrinker. The guidelines, which come up for review every five years, go in the opposite direction of former Surgeon General Vivek Murthy, who tied alcohol to at least seven kinds of cancer and put out a call for warning labels. The new verbiage is expected to be "so vague as to be unhelpful," says Eva Greenthal, a senior policy scientist at the Center for Science in the Public Interest.
About that aforementioned alcohol industry: Reuters notes that Anheuser-Busch InBev and Diageo have poured millions into lobbying the Senate alone for a change in the guidelines. The industry has a right to feel threatened, as a recent study found that 49% of Americans are trying to drink less, with 1 in 4 Americans who don't drink at all—a rising trend among Gen Z and millennials, who increasingly view alcohol as harmful. The guidelines were backed by two studies, one of which found that drinking increases the risk of some cancers, but lessens the chance of dying of any cause. The other found that the risk of death increases with any level of drinking. The guidelines are still in development and could be released this month. (More alcohol stories.)
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