Trump suppressed a major government-led study on alcohol, health, and risk of death meant to guide the writing of the 2025 Dietary Guidelines for Americans. Although a draft of the report had been released for public comment, this was, nonetheless, a big win for the alcohol industry.
This week the scientists who did the research published the results that Trump, Republicans in Congress, and the alcohol industry don’t like. The paper appeared in the peer-reviewed Journal of Studies on Alcohol and Drugs.
We’ll walk through what the research says, and, I’m sorry, it may not be good news if you enjoy alcohol, as I and most Americans do.
But first, here’s what has happened.
The Interagency Coordinating Committee on the Prevention of Underage Drinking, a group with expert scientists endorsed by the USDA, Health and Human Services, and many agencies, was tasked in April 2022 with studying the effect of alcohol on health. Later in 2022 Congress passed a law mandating a similar report from the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine. On paper, the two studies were meant to be complementary and to inform recommendations on alcohol intake in the 2025 Dietary Guidelines. But the National Academies research was tainted from the outset by the strong financial links of some of its scientists to the alcohol industry.
Congress attacks the work of the Interagency Committee
During their nearly three years of work, the integrity of the Interagency Committee process was assaulted by Republican Congressmen acting in tandem with the alcohol lobby, who feared the tightening of the 2020 Dietary Guidelines, which recommended limiting alcohol to two drinks per day for men and one drink a day for women. The lobby also feared the Interagency Report would state that alcohol was a cause of cancer, since that evidence had already been solidified in the scientific literature.
Representative James Comer, Republican from Kentucky, home of Bourbon whiskey, led an aggressive congressional investigation into the work of the Interagency Committee. In January 2025, at the release of the draft report, Comer issued press releases from the House Oversight Committee on Reform accusing the Committee of work that was unlawful, biased, and wasteful, and executed with a predetermined outcome using cherry-picked data.
Meanwhile, the National Academies of Sciences report had been released a month earlier, in December 2024.
National Academies report finds drinking causes breast cancer
The National Academies of Sciences found that drinking was a cause of breast cancer. This was bad news for the alcohol industry but represented the minimum about cancer the Academies report could say, given the mounting evidence. The National Academies scientists also reported there was what they called “mid-grade” evidence, not strong but not weak, that moderate drinking, defined as one drink per day or less, resulted in a 16% decrease in risk of death compared to non-drinkers. The alcohol industry liked this.
Interagency Committee report finds drinking causes seven types of cancer
On the other hand the Interagency Committee draft report found “… the risk of dying from alcohol use begins at low levels of average use” and from there, the more alcohol the more the risk. In contradiction of the 2020 Dietary Guidelines, the Interagency report said men generally have the same level of risk as women, which is a one in 1,000 risk of dying from alcohol use if consumption is more than 7 drinks per week. The risk increases to one in 100 with more than 9 drinks per week. The Interagency Report also found that seven types of cancer, not just breast cancer, were causes of alcohol-related deaths.
These Interagency Committee results were not at all friendly to the alcohol industry, or, frankly, to the many people who drink in what is considered moderation. If the Dietary Guidelines were going to be written in alignment with this study by Health and Human Services and the USDA, the new Guidelines would need to lower the 2020 Guidelines’ recommended limit on alcohol of two drinks per day for men and one for women and add a warning that alcohol is a cause of cancer.
The Interagency report is 86’d
But the Trump administration took office two weeks after the Interagency draft was released and the report was never finished and published.
The 2025 Dietary Guidelines on alcohol are toasted by the alcohol industry
When the 2025 Dietary Guidelines were finally finished and released in January 2026, based on a new made-to-order, quasi-scientific report, the alcohol lobby was flush with success. The new Guidelines removed the recommended limit on drinking and instead simply advised, if drinking, to drink in moderation. Going against the science in both the Interagency and the National Academies reports, the Guidelines made no mention of cancer.
The Interagency research re-surfaces in a peer-reviewed journal
This week the six original authors of the Interagency report, joined by 19 additional co-authors, published a paper with the results of the Interagency research. Their original findings stand that low levels of drinking don’t have a protective effect – a little alcohol isn’t necessarily bad, but it isn’t good for you. A little more alcohol and then the risk of disease, including cancer, and death becomes apparent. At 8.5 drinks per week the risk of an alcohol-related death becomes one in 100, for both men and women. At the previous recommended limit of 14 drinks per week for men, the risk of an alcohol-related death is one in 25.
The publication of this paper is important. It stood up to independent peer review, has four times the number of authors as the original report, and can now be cited by other scientists, policy makers, and program designers going forward.
100,000 cancer cases annually due to alcohol
Studies have found about 20,000 to 25,000 annual American cancer deaths due to drinking. 83% of these deaths could be prevented by drinking within the 2020 Dietary Guidelines of a maximum of two drinks per day for men, one for women. In thinking about the meaning of this statistic for your own choices, remember that these are just cancer deaths, and that cancer cases due to alcohol total about 100,000 annually. Any case of cancer tends to have a bad impact on life.
These two reports raise somewhat different levels of alarm, but both make clear cancer is a risk with drinking.
That alcohol causes cancer has so far escaped the knowledge of 60% of Americans. There will be better awareness of alcohol’s relationship to cancer if and when a warning is incorporated in the Dietary Guidelines, as it should have been this year.
Informing Americans about the risk
The word is getting out there despite the power of the alcohol lobby. In January 2025, just before Trump took over, the U.S. Surgeon General’s office issued a report saying alcohol is a leading cause of preventable cancer. And, don’t tell Trump this, the CDC still has a web page listing the seven cancers caused by alcohol and advising that reducing drinking lowers cancer risk. By the way, the CDC takes the trouble to point out that red wine (or white, for that matter) carries the same risk as beer and hard liquor.
Making personal choices
Given that the National Academies group had financial links to the alcohol industry and was engaged by Congress to provide a counter to the work of the Interagency group, I lean toward the findings of the more worrisome Interagency Committee study. Of course, neither endorses drinking as a safe habit. As someone who enjoys alcohol, I am still weighing my own, personal level of concern.
I do know I am thankful for the work of all the genuine, independent scientists and public health officials publishing and acting on this issue and that the findings of the Interagency Committee and the National Academies were able to be brought into the open despite the efforts of the Trump administration to repress science it doesn’t like. Let us know what you think in the comments!
Thank you for reading.
