According to the Canadian Center on Substance Use and Addiction (CCSA), drinking just three glasses of alcohol a week poses a “moderate” health risk.
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Drinking two standard drinks (equivalent to 12 oz of beer with 5% alcohol) increases the risk of injury or other problems for most people, according to the CCSA report released Tuesday.
Therefore, consuming three to six glasses a week increases the risk of developing certain types of cancer, such as breast or colon cancer.
Consuming seven or more drinks a week increases your risk of heart disease or stroke. With each additional drink, the risk of developing health problems, illnesses or other injuries increases “exponentially”, warns the CCSA.
The document also reminds that during pregnancy “the safest thing is zero alcohol.”
The expert group behind this report was commissioned to update the latest Canadian Alcohol Drinking Guidelines (DCAFR), published in November 2011.
With this new document, the CCSA does not intend to “set a consumption threshold below which there is no risk”, but to provide “benchmarks”.
- Listen to the interview with Genviève Desautels on Sophie Durocher’s show, broadcast live daily at 2:35 p.m. via QUB radio :
“Simple and Acceptable” policies
In a press release issued Tuesday morning, Educ’alcool welcomed the revisions made by the CCSA.
“In our opinion, it is important that the guidelines transmitted are perceived as simple and acceptable by the population, in order to avoid them being counterproductive in terms of prevention,” explained Geneviève Desautels, Managing Director of Éduc’alcool.
“We want the guidelines to be clear, to have strong support, to include collective and individual action, and to appeal to people’s intelligence. For this reason, we also find the new directive most relevant, which requires that the number of standard drinks contained be indicated on the containers by alcohol strength and volume,” adds Ms. Desautels.
How can you reduce your alcohol consumption?
If you drink alcohol every day or only on weekends and want to limit it, here are some tips.
- respect the limits you set for yourself;
- choose drinks with a low percentage of alcohol;
- drink slowly, in small sips;
- always have a jug of water handy;
- have one soft drink for every glass of alcohol you drink;
- Try recipes for non-alcoholic cocktails.