Antonio Manaytay – Fourth Estate Contributor
Madison, WI, United States (4E) – The warning “Drink Moderately” if heeded could have saved lives more than ever. This after several experts said that cancers, at least seven of them, are linked to excessive drinking.
In a statement, published on November 7 in the Journal of Clinical Oncology, the oncologists said: “alcohol drinking is an established risk factor for several malignancies, and it is a potentially modifiable risk factor for cancer.”
The oncologists said the warning to avoid excessive drinking has “important implications for cancer preventions.”
Excessive drinking is linked by oncologists to seven types of cancer: mouth, throat, esophagus, liver, breast, and colon. They said about 5.5 percent of new cancers are closely linked to drinking alcohol while 5.8 percent of deaths due to cancer were attributed to alcohol. In the United States alone, some 3.5 percent of all cancer deaths are due to drinking alcohol.
The Centers for Disease Control Prevention for its part said alcohol use and abuse pose a serious problem to public health. Excessive drinking had accounted for about 88,000 deaths in the United States for the period 2006 and 2010, and 3.3 million deaths worldwide.
The oncologists warned that even modest alcohol drinking could increase the risk of cancer but heavy or excessive drinking poses the greatest risk.
The oncologists, members of the American Society of Clinical Oncology (ASCO), said they had not addressed the issue of alcohol and cancer despite the presence of strong evidence to link the two. This is the first time ASCO, composed of the nation’s top oncologists, had put their feet forward as an organization and add their voices to the discourse.
The paper, according to oncologist Noelle LoConte of the University of Wisconsin, is aimed at educating the public and cancer patients. It could also serve as a guide for medical professionals everywhere.
Most people and cancer patients including some of the oncologists, she said, are not conversant of the risk posed by alcohol drinking.
“This was an opportunity for us to raise awareness,” she said.
ASCO, she said, also calls for new research on alcohol use and the recurrence of disease among cancer patients.
It is also helpful if new research will be conducted to address the popular notion that drinking alcohol has health benefits, she said.
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