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Party pooper: Consuming alcohol significantly increases your chance of getting cancer. To the point that it compares with asbestos, radiation and tobacco.
https://www.partnershipagainstcancer.ca/topics/alcohol-policies/background-statistics/
https://www.who.int/europe/news/item/04-01-2023-no-level-of-alcohol-consumption-is-safe-for-our-health
https://www.aacr.org/patients-caregivers/progress-against-cancer/americans-largely-unaware-of-link-between-consumption-of-alcoholic-beverages-and-risk-of-cancer/
https://www.fau.edu/newsdesk/articles/alcohol-use-cancer-risk
A recent study counters that info a little bit (says there isn't a link for some cancers) but it's important to note that the study is still disputed. Also, cancer is on top of liver and heart disease, dementia and many other things that alcohol is known to directly increase.
You should do your best to reduce your alcohol consumption or cut it out completely - if you care about your health.
I clicked one of the links, and read the study.
450ml of liquor per week isn't light to moderate by most definitions? If you don't drink 2 nights a week that's 5 medically significant binges per week, every week. One "drink" in this context is 1oz (~29ml). Most of the doctors I've been to, when asking how much you drink, will even ask of you have 15 drinks per week. They cut that off at 7+.
While a lot of us don't know the link to cancer, I'd imagine most of us know there's something there.
I'm fine with doing alcohol like we did cigarettes, I was just kinda shocked that they called "5 medically significant binges per week" light to moderate drinking??? Even when I was drinking an amount that people were talking about doing an intervention for, it was less than half of that (1oz (29.5ml) per day)
In the UK we measured alcohol in units the recommended limit being 14/ week. Spirits like vodka are served in 1 unit = 25ml. So their low to medium drinking is already more than the UK national recommendation by 4 drinks and you'd be getting advice on how to reduce your drinking by a Dr. Though that 450ml/week is real easy to get to that's one vodka and coke per day if your free pouring rather than measuring. Many lay people wouldn't consider that a problem at all.
Admittedly we do have a fairly problematic relationship with alcohol in this country.
Definitely agree with your take to make booze harder to get and more highly taxed like smoking. At least the younger generations seem to not be drinking so much.
Yeah, I've seen a lot of articles saying that GenZ is drinking less overall, and what they're buying is nicer, which is making it harder for the alcopop companies that sell bulk cheap booze.
I think we tax alcohol higher in the States, and it depends on where you live for how difficult it is. Some places you can't get any alcohol at the grocery store, some you can buy beer/wine at the grocery store, but anything harder is at a state-run liquor store, and some places they'll sell you vodka at Walmart. There's more variance, but yeah, depending on where you live alcohol's more difficult to get than cigarettes, since those are at most grocery stores.
Anywhere you can buy food here you can probably get alcohol. Corner shops, petrol stations, supermarkets all have booze.