WOMEN IN AMERICA have long been told to stick to a maximum of one alcoholic drink a day—be it a bottle of beer, a medium glass of wine or a standard shot of hard liquor. Men could double that and still fall within America’s official dietary guidelines, which are reviewed every five years. But the next revision, due by the end of the year, may scrap these limits altogether. According to Reuters, a news agency, the agriculture and health departments
WOMEN IN AMERICA have long been told to stick to a maximum of one alcoholic drink a day—be it a bottle of beer, a medium glass of wine or a standard shot of hard liquor. Men could double that and still fall within America’s official dietary guidelines, which are reviewed every five years. But the next revision, due by the end of the year, may scrap these limits altogether. According to Reuters, a news agency, the agriculture and health departments are considering replacing them with a vaguer suggestion: to “drink in moderation”.
That is a famously fuzzy phrase. Polling by The Economist and YouGov of more than 1,600 Americans shows a big variation in people’s definition of moderation (see charts 1 and 2).
On average, men defined moderation as 2.1 drinks a day—almost bang on the current guidance. For women the median answer was 1.6. But around 25% of men and 28% of women said that moderation meant not drinking at all. Others swung the other way: more than a quarter of men and a tenth of women thought four or more drinks per day still counted as moderate.
Men under 30 were the most abstemious, typically capping moderation at one drink. (Women under 30 said 1.7.) More than 60% of young men said they had not had a drink in the past month, the highest of any group. Millennial men drank the most, but millennials of both genders were also the most likely to say they exceeded what they considered moderate.
Health officials still struggle to define moderation. That heavy drinking harms health is undisputed. But the effect of moderate or light drinking is murkier. Some studies suggest a benefit from light consumption; others say this is a statistical mirage, since light drinkers often share other genuinely healthy habits. The joy of enjoying a drink with friends is harder to measure, but probably carries some emotional benefits.
Guidelines on upper limits vary by country, but America is already among the most permissive in the rich world. Official health advice in Britain suggests that neither men nor women should have more than 14 units a week for men and women (roughly eight American drinks). Other European countries give the same advice as America, but standard European measures are roughly a third smaller than American ones. Canada is more relaxed—its official guidelines suggest no more than 15 American-sized drinks a week for men and ten for women. (Other government-backed institutions in Canada are more conservative.)
The proposed change in America would buck global trends where restrictions are becoming tighter. It would also contradict recent warnings at home. Earlier this year Vivek Murthy, at the time America’s Surgeon General, issued an advisory against alcohol, calling it the country’s third-leading preventable cause of cancer, after tobacco and obesity. It would also be a curious move under Robert F. Kennedy junior, the health secretary, who is a teetotaller with a slogan to “Make America Healthy Again” (although his methods have drawn scrutiny).
Whether this will come in or not is still unclear, given Mr Kennedy’s views. And in any case, any guidance would largely go ignored. In our poll just 28% of Republicans said they valued public-health advice when it came to alcohol. A little more than half of Democrats said the same. For many Americans, moderation remains in the eye of the beer-holder.
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