The subject of how much alcohol Americans can or should consume made national headlines, sparked an outcry online and came up in a White House briefing this week.
The headlines claim an “alcohol czar” with the Biden administration is pushing to limit beer consumption to two a week.
One tweet with more than 369,000 views says: “Biden’s Alcohol Czar wants to limit you to TWO beers per week. YEAH, a huh, like we’re doing that!”
Michael sent in a question on the VERIFY website asking us to VERIFY an alleged “Biden beer ban.”
THE QUESTION
Has the government recommendation on alcohol consumption changed to two drinks per week?
THE SOURCES
- U.S. Dietary Guidelines for Americans
- Canada’s Guidance on Alcohol and Health: Final Report
- The Daily Mail interview with Dr. George Koob, director of the National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism
THE ANSWER
No, the recommendation on alcohol consumption hasn’t changed to two drinks a week. The current alcohol recommendations of one to two drinks per day are in place until at least 2025. After that, the U.S. could revise the guidelines.
WHAT WE FOUND
The current U.S. Dietary Guidelines for Americans, which are developed by government agencies using research on healthy eating and drinking, recommend that adults who choose to consume alcohol should drink in moderation – that means one drink or less on a day for women and two drinks or less on a day for men.
The current recommendations on alcohol consumption were set by the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) in the 1990s and haven’t changed since then. Every five years, the agency publishes a report with the dietary recommendations and the next report is due to be published in 2025. The guidelines could change for some food or beverage items, or they could stay the same.
Dr. George Koob, the director of the National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism, was recently Interviewed by the British tabloid, The Daily Mail. Koob was asked about whether he thought the guidance on alcohol consumption could change.
“I mean, they’re not going to go up, I’m pretty sure,” Koob speculated to The Daily Mail. “So, if [alcohol consumption guidelines] go in any direction, it would be toward Canada.”
In Canada, it is recommended for people to consume two alcoholic drinks or less per week. To be clear, the guidelines in Canada and the U.S. are not actual rules nor restrictions on how much booze Canadians or Americans can consume.
The current U.S. dietary guidelines report says: “To help Americans move toward a healthy dietary pattern and minimize risks associated with drinking, adults of legal drinking age can choose not to drink or to drink in moderation by limiting intakes to 2 drinks or less in a day for men and 1 drink or less in a day for women, on days when alcohol is consumed. This is not intended as an average over several days, but rather the amount consumed on any single day,” the guidelines say.
The development of new guidelines is reviewed by an advisory committee composed of scientific experts who review the facts, along with public and agency comments, and help inform the USDA and the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) implementation of the guidelines.
Koob is not listed as a current member of the advisory committee that helps inform the guidelines. There was no mention in The Daily Mail article on whether he would be sitting on the advisory committee to help inform the 2025 guidelines.
VERIFY reached out to the USDA, HHS and to Koob for comment but did not hear back from them at the time of publication.
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