There is no completely safe level of regular alcohol drinking, England’s chief medical officer Sally Davies warned today as she unveiled new consumption guidelines for the UK.

From now on, men and women should all aim to drink no more than 14 units of alcohol a week, and should spread their consumption evenly over two or three days rather than drinking every day or in one protracted session.

14 units equates roughly to a bottle and a half of wine, or six or seven pints of medium-strength beer. “It means you can safely share one bottle of wine with your partner on a Friday night, another on Saturday, and maybe one for Sunday lunch,” says Nick Sheron, a liver specialist at the University of Southampton, UK.


The advice is based on evidence from studies carried out around the world over the last 20 years that collectively paint a much more negative picture of alcohol’s effects than was appreciated at the last government review of drinking in 1995. These include links between drinking and various cancers, and diminishing evidence that small amounts of alcohol protect against heart disease. The science has prompted Davies and her colleagues to announce that there is “no safe limit” for alcohol consumption.

Cancer risks

The new guidelines downgrade the amount people are advised to drink to the weekly collective tally of 14 units – down from 3 to 4 units a day for men and 2 to 3 units for women. For the first time, the limit is the same for men and women, dispelling previous assumptions that men can safely drink more because they’re generally physically bigger.

The main long-term risks come from a variety of cancers, says the government review. It reports that the lifetime risks of a woman developing breast cancer, and men and women developing bowel and liver cancer are roughly the same for non-drinkers and drinkers who stay within the weekly 14-unit limit. But the risk for each type of cancer is doubled if people double their consumption to more than 35 units a week.

However, there are some diseases for which the risk is elevated even when people stick to levels below the new recommendation. For example, the risk of oesophageal cancer is 1.27 per cent in men who drink 14 units a week but less than half that – 0.6 per cent – in men who abstain completely. If men drink double the recommended amount, the risk is 5.77 per cent. Women’s risks rise similarly. This has led the authors to conclude that “there is no level of regular drinking that can be considered completely safe”, and to align the recommendation for both sexes.

“Everyone thinks alcohol equals liver disease, but now they’re saying alcohol equals cancer, which throws a new boomerang into the mix,” says Kevin Moore, a liver specialist at the Royal Free Hospital in London, who collaborated with New Scientist staff two years ago in an experiment that revealed potential health benefits of giving up alcohol for a month. “I think it will have a major impact on perception, so it will be interesting to see what the drinks industry comes back with.”

Drinking at the recommended limit would result in people having a 1 in 100 chance of dying from an alcohol-related condition over their lifetime, a level of risk that the report says is comparable to risks from other regular or routine activities, such as driving.

Disproportionate effects

“It’s appropriate to set the guidelines at the equivalent of 14 units a week,” says Peter Anderson, who researches addictions and alcohol at Newcastle University, UK. “This may seem low to many people, but the level reflects the scientific evidence.”

The other big shift from the previous government review is shrinking evidence that modest amounts of alcohol – 1 unit or less per day – protect against heart disease. Now, the review says that the only likely beneficiaries are women of 55 or over.

Sheron says this is important because it means that what benefits there are only help women in older age, whereas the adverse impacts of alcohol on young drinkers are dramatically disproportionate. The review points out that young people suffer disproportionately from alcohol-related accidents and injuries, especially after binge-drinking. If someone has drunk 5 to 7 units over 3 to 6 hours, for example, the risk of injury rises by between twofold and fivefold, it says.

The advice continues to say that pregnant women should aim to give up drinking throughout their pregnancy. “Drinking heavily during pregnancy can cause a baby to develop fetal alcohol syndrome, a serious condition in which children have restricted growth, facial abnormalities and learning and behavioural disorders which are long lasting and may be lifelong,” it warns.

One criticism of the report is that it persists with using units, a convention unique to the UK. One unit is equivalent to 8 grams of pure alcohol. “It’s a pity the guidelines didn’t take the jump and move away from this very confusing concept to grams of alcohol,” says Anderson.

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