Due to California Proposition 65 - we have cancer warnings on everything. And I mean everything…the lobby in the building, inside the elevator, on the couch you buy, the vacuum - yup - known to the State of CA to cause cancer.
The end result…no one pays attention. So, at least for those of us in CA…another ‘This is known to cause cancer’ label is about as ‘meh’ as ‘meh’ can get.
That’s not much of a warning label.
Keeping with the topic of the thread, I used to be really good at 12 oz curls…
We, as a society, aren’t directly inserting (e.g., feminine products), drinking, eating or inhaling couches though. 
I stopped drinking alcohol in the late 1980’s, possibly early 1990’s, IIRC, which apparently is when the “direct link between alcohol use and cancer was first established in the late 1980s, and evidence for this link has strengthened over time.”
https://www.hhs.gov/sites/default/files/oash-alcohol-cancer-risk.pdf
Guinness “might” lower cholesterol. I saw it on the internet so it must be true…
I have mentioned before, I had started drinking much more than over the last year—was using wine to help with some sleep problems so was drinking most nights. I decided a few months back to stop completely. My sleep is generally better (though no magic cure) but otherwise I don’t really feel any different physically. I would be totally fine with occasional drinking but strangely I just don’t enjoy it anymore. Over the holidays, I drank seltzer. I eat very healthy so am glad to have made this change.
I was listening to a doctor on CNN today (might have been one of our more recent surgeon generals?) and he said the point of the warnings on alcohol containers is to get people to start paying attention. He also said that if you had one of the other major risk factors for cancer (smoking or obesity), it’s best to not add to your risk by drinking a lot of of alcohol, however, if you didn’t have one of those risk factors, a beer or a glass of wine isn’t going to add very much risk.
This makes so much sense! My husband ran 6 marathons in 3 years (Boston twice, NYC once, LA once and 3 locals) and was in incredible shape internally. He burnt himself out by running 5 days a week for 3 years in all kinds of weather.
He hasn’t trained for 2 years now, nor done much exercise. Lots of stress at work. Stress eating, eating too much. Just went for his physical. Gained 15 lbs, pre-diabetic, hypertension. It’s scary in just 2 years.
He’s someone that needs a goal, so as soon as the snow melts, I imagine he’ll get back to it. We’ve already decided to cut back the alcohol, and sweets. But exercise… that was the key for him.
With respect to an earlier understanding of the benefits of alcohol consumption, I believe one path progressed something like this: the French paradox –> wine –> resveratrol –> David Sinclair / Harvard –> sirtuins –> a plan to reformulate resveratrol into a patentable version –> an intermediate company –> GlaxoSmithKline –> $720 million –> kind of nowhere.
Was the study conducted by Guinness?
No, but their advertising campaign was about health a hundred years ago. 
This article makes the following point:
Rimm isn’t sure if putting a label on alcohol is the right approach. “What I would hate for it to do is to scare people away or have them feel terrible about having a glass of wine socially with someone,” he said. Although it made sense to put warning labels on cigarettes, he said, “for cigarettes the risk was twenty times what we’re talking about now for alcohol and breast cancer.”
I haven’t looked at the comparative data, but I expect that is more a function of how bad cigarettes are to one’s health, and not that the alcohol/breast cancer link isn’t concerning or worthy of putting on a warning label. Also at play is there aren’t clear guidelines as to what level of risk (for anything) merits a warning label. I expect politics play into these decisions, which IMO is wrong.
From the article in the OP:
For example, the absolute risk of breast cancer over a woman’s life span is about 11.3 percent (11 out of 100) for those who have less than a drink a week.
The risk increases to 13.1 percent (13 of 100 individuals) at one drink a day, and up to 15.3 percent (15 of 100) at two drinks per day.
Is that enough for a warning label? I don’t know of course, and glad I don’t have to make the decision.
In another study, 3,410 breast cancer deaths in 2021-21 were attributed to alcohol consumption:
Among women, the largest number of alcohol-attributable cancer deaths was from breast cancer (3,410 deaths), accounting for 60.3% of women’s alcohol-attributable cancer deaths.
From the same study:
An estimated 20,216 cancer deaths/year were attributable to alcohol (men: 14,562 [72.0%]; women: 5,654 [28.0%]) (Table 1), or 3.4% of all cancer deaths.
https://www.ajpmonline.org/article/S0749-3797(23)00501-9/fulltext
Is 3.4% of all cancer deaths being alcohol attributable worthy of a warning label? Like I said above, I don’t know the answer.
The same professor:
He said that the advisory’s summary of the evidence is not new information—it’s been known for decades that alcohol poses a cancer risk—but he said he was surprised that less than half the U.S. population knows about it.
A warning would fix this, at least.
I don’t know how they figure out the true causes of people’s cancer. How can they have any idea? For example, if I had cancer, how would they possibly know whether it was the 37 years of radiation exposure, exposure to different chemical and construction elements, too much chocolate, pesticides, heavy metals, contaminants in my water, plastics, heredity (I have a very small family) or alcohol? Since they cannot possibly know all these variables about me over my lifetime (because I certainly don’t know them), how can they possibly claim that XX.X% of cancers are due to alcohol consumption? I just don’t buy it.
Then again, I did buy those studies that said a glass of 
a night is good for your health. Hmm……
That is a great piece, lots of good health related advice. I really like that she’s expanded topics and contributors.
Ten days into “Dry January” and I made it through our January sales meeting unscathed. There were 7 new products to sample this morning. I got my fair share of ribbing.
I really don’t get Dry January – just giving your liver a rest for a few weeks before it’s back to “Shut up liver, you’re fine” in February?
(I did read the article above with the study that showed that those who abstained in January drank less six months later. They did not survey the people I know.)
