The US has ditched guidance that had advised Americans to limit the number of alcoholic drinks consumed in a day.
In new dietary guidelines covering the 2025-2030 period, the Trump administration has recommended to “limit alcoholic beverages” and “consume less alcohol for better overall health”.
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It scraps previous guidance that had recommended limiting daily consumption to “two drinks or less” for men and “one drink or less” for women.
The latest advice has also removed any warnings about the connection between higher alcohol consumption and increased mortality risk.
Similar to the previous set of guidelines, which covered 2020 to 2025, the latest recommendations advise pregnant women, people recovering from alcohol use disorder or who cannot control their consumption, should avoid drinking completely.
Those who have alcohol use disorder in their family history are also advised to “be mindful” of drinking “and associated addictive behaviours”.
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By GlobalDataIn a note to clients yesterday (7 January), Bernstein analyst Nadine Sarwat said the new advice was “at least a sign of relief” for the alcohol industry, as some had worried stricter guidance could have been put in place.
A year ago, the US Surgeon General had issued an advisory recommending updates to alcoholic beverage labels to include warnings about the risks of cancer.
Later that month, a federal report was released which also confirmed that even low levels of alcohol consumption increase mortality risk.
The draft findings from the Interagency Coordinating Committee on the Prevention of Underage Drinking (ICCPUD) indicated that in the US, “males and females have a 1 in 1000 risk of dying from alcohol use if they consume more than seven drinks per week”.
The report had been one of two studies intended to inform the new Dietary Guidelines for Americans for 2025 to 2030. In September however, it emerged the Trump administration had shelved the final draft of the study.
Alongside the Alcohol Intake and Health Study, the second study intended to inform the new dietary guidelines was the Review of Evidence on Alcohol and Health, published at the end of last year by the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine (NASEM).
NASEM’s findings suggested that “with moderate certainty… compared with never consuming alcohol, moderate alcohol consumption is associated with lower all-cause mortality”. It clarified that “all-cause mortality refers to the total number of deaths in a population due to any cause”.
The study did, however, highlight “with moderate certainty” that moderate alcohol consumption was linked to an increased risk of women developing breast cancer.
Reflecting on the new guidelines, Science Over Bias, a coalition of US drinks, agriculture and hospitality industries, said: “The Dietary Guidelines’ longstanding, overarching advice is that if alcohol is consumed, it should be done in moderation. These updated guidelines, underpinned by the preponderance of scientific evidence, reaffirm this important guidance.”
