On the way out the door Biden’s Surgeon General Vivek Murthy made a case for a strong link between cancer and alcohol use and wanted to put warning labels on alcohol bottles. Further, he wanted to eliminate the long-held recommendation that two drinks a day for a man and one drink a day for a woman was a safe level of alcohol use.

The alcohol industry had numerous fears that alcohol would be treated like a carcinogen and that the government would adopt the extreme Trudeau Canadian standards of three to six drinks a week putting one’s health at risk.

The fears were warranted as reports indicated that the U.S. Dietary Guidelines could even include language that no amount of alcohol is acceptable for a healthy lifestyle.[1]

The impact on the liquor industry would be obvious as government changing standards would substantially impact the alcohol industry through fear mongering.

Additionally, the industry would face further liabilities, as class action law firms like Parker Waichman were ready to pounce.

The industry was on needles and pins wondering what the report would say.

Thankfully for the industry, those fears were alleviated. The Trump administration pulled back reports of a link between cancer and even a small amount of alcohol use.

Influenced by competing viewpoints that the nutritional guidelines studies lacked scientific credibility, the Trump administration decided not to issue the guidelines.

This is fantastic news for the industry. The six-member board on dietary guidelines included an anti-alcohol radical from Canada named Tim Naimi, who heavily influenced the Canadian Trudeau standards.

Instead of a radical unaccountable six member commission deciding the fate of the industry through imperfect science, the Trump administration properly accounted for the views of others, and didn’t take the easy road of not resisting and allowing the suspect report to go forward.

An American report on dietary guidelines as bad as Canada’s would be devastating to the liquor industry. Thankfully the Trump administration took the rational step of acknowledging diverse points of view and not allowing a radical extreme to hijack the narrative.

 

[1] https://tomwark.substack.com/p/no-amount-alcohol-healthy