5 ms·

This is a frustrating article, because it does not say how dangerous alcohol is. Maybe alcohol raises the risk of certain types of cancers, but only by a very t

by idoh 6y ago

This is a frustrating article, because it does not say how dangerous alcohol is. Maybe alcohol raises the risk of certain types of cancers, but only by a very tiny amount. Relative to other risks, even other risks from alcohol, do we really need to care about that?

weRnotU 6y ago
Do we need to care about your strawman? No.
csours 6y ago
> "A public health analysis published last year estimated that the cancer risk posed by drinking one bottle of wine a week was comparable to smoking five cigarettes for men and 10 for women in the same time span." I'd like to have better statistics than this, but they did try to communicate something about the risk. The problem with comparing the cancer risk to cigarettes is that tobacco does a lot of other bad stuff besides just the cancer - tar, nicotine affect your heart and lungs pretty strongly.
- ogre_codes 6y ago
  Alcohol does a lot of bad stuff besides cause cancer as well. Primarily damage to the liver, but other effects as well.
ogre_codes 6y ago
There are some indications on there: > A public health analysis published last year estimated that the cancer risk posed by drinking one bottle of wine a week was comparable to smoking five cigarettes for men and 10 for women in the same time span.
Barrin92 6y ago
from the national cancer institute: >"Pooled data from 118 individual studies indicates that light drinkers have a slightly increased (1.04-fold higher) risk of breast cancer, compared with nondrinkers. The risk increase is greater in moderate drinkers (1.23-fold higher) and heavy drinkers (1.6-fold higher" Heavy and moderate drinking at the very least seems to be quite significant. Esophageal cancer is one that also came to my mind because I know of quite a few heavy drinkers who suffered from it, Christopher Hitchens for example.
Ovah 6y ago
Here are some actual numbers for risk increase. Heavy drinkers have a 5-fold increased risk of getting head and neck cancer, esofageal cancer, and 2-fold increase for liver cancer. The source also reviews colorectal, breast and head+neck cancer. My opinion as a medical professional is that these are significant, and not "very tiny amounts", of increased risk. https://www.cancer.gov/about-cancer/causes-prevention/risk/alcohol/alcohol-fact-sheet https://www.cancer.gov/about-cancer/causes-prevention/risk/a...
- dekhn 6y ago
  those are relative risks, you need to state them in absolute risk if you want people to be able to understand and make decisions. If the absolute baseline risk of getting head and neck cancer is very low, then having a 5x risk over that isn't really important- it's still absolutely small enough to say "don't care, compared to other risks". And in alcohol, there's a long list of risks that will cause the majority of deaths compared to cancer.
  - eganist 6y ago
    > you need to state them in absolute risk if you want people to be able to understand and make decisions. I refute this on the grounds that an alarming number of people seem not to care about their own health given a 1/1000 risk of death (or worse for older or at-risk populations) from SARS-CoV-2. If half the country doesn't care about those odds, what makes us think any measurable amount of people will care about... don't know, 1/50k odds? But I see where you're coming from. In a perfect world, you'd be right.
    - kevinskii 6y ago
      The goal shouldn't be to get people to do what you want. It should be to give them sufficient information so they can make an informed decision on their own, even if you might disagree with it. I'm not suggesting that personal liberty should trump SARS-Cov-2 precautions, but it's not really relevant to a discussion about whether risk should be framed in absolute terms or not. (Edited for clarity.)
tyingq 6y ago
I'd argue the other dangers of (significant) alcohol use far outweigh cancer.

by idoh 6y ago

weRnotU 6y ago

Do we need to care about your strawman? No.

csours 6y ago

> "A public health analysis published last year estimated that the cancer risk posed by drinking one bottle of wine a week was comparable to smoking five cigarettes for men and 10 for women in the same time span." I'd like to have better statistics than this, but they did try to communicate something about the risk. The problem with comparing the cancer risk to cigarettes is that tobacco does a lot of other bad stuff besides just the cancer - tar, nicotine affect your heart and lungs pretty strongly.

ogre_codes 6y ago
Alcohol does a lot of bad stuff besides cause cancer as well. Primarily damage to the liver, but other effects as well.

ogre_codes 6y ago

There are some indications on there: > A public health analysis published last year estimated that the cancer risk posed by drinking one bottle of wine a week was comparable to smoking five cigarettes for men and 10 for women in the same time span.

Barrin92 6y ago

from the national cancer institute: >"Pooled data from 118 individual studies indicates that light drinkers have a slightly increased (1.04-fold higher) risk of breast cancer, compared with nondrinkers. The risk increase is greater in moderate drinkers (1.23-fold higher) and heavy drinkers (1.6-fold higher" Heavy and moderate drinking at the very least seems to be quite significant. Esophageal cancer is one that also came to my mind because I know of quite a few heavy drinkers who suffered from it, Christopher Hitchens for example.

Ovah 6y ago

Here are some actual numbers for risk increase. Heavy drinkers have a 5-fold increased risk of getting head and neck cancer, esofageal cancer, and 2-fold increase for liver cancer. The source also reviews colorectal, breast and head+neck cancer. My opinion as a medical professional is that these are significant, and not "very tiny amounts", of increased risk. https://www.cancer.gov/about-cancer/causes-prevention/risk/alcohol/alcohol-fact-sheet https://www.cancer.gov/about-cancer/causes-prevention/risk/a...

dekhn 6y ago
those are relative risks, you need to state them in absolute risk if you want people to be able to understand and make decisions. If the absolute baseline risk of getting head and neck cancer is very low, then having a 5x risk over that isn't really important- it's still absolutely small enough to say "don't care, compared to other risks". And in alcohol, there's a long list of risks that will cause the majority of deaths compared to cancer.
- eganist 6y ago
  > you need to state them in absolute risk if you want people to be able to understand and make decisions. I refute this on the grounds that an alarming number of people seem not to care about their own health given a 1/1000 risk of death (or worse for older or at-risk populations) from SARS-CoV-2. If half the country doesn't care about those odds, what makes us think any measurable amount of people will care about... don't know, 1/50k odds? But I see where you're coming from. In a perfect world, you'd be right.
  - kevinskii 6y ago
    The goal shouldn't be to get people to do what you want. It should be to give them sufficient information so they can make an informed decision on their own, even if you might disagree with it. I'm not suggesting that personal liberty should trump SARS-Cov-2 precautions, but it's not really relevant to a discussion about whether risk should be framed in absolute terms or not. (Edited for clarity.)

tyingq 6y ago

I'd argue the other dangers of (significant) alcohol use far outweigh cancer.