Why Canadians may find conflicting advice on cutting back alcohol

Some people observe "Dry January" at the beginning of a new year, in which people will refrain from drinking alcohol for the month.

As some people try to cut down their drinking and embrace Dry January, they may look to Canada’s health agencies for guidance — and find some conflicting advice.

This week, the Canadian Institute for Substance Use Research launched a website where users can calculate their health risks — including cancer, heart disease and stroke — based on the amount of alcohol they consume.

The website is built on guidelines issued two years ago by the government-supported Canadian Centre on Substance Use and Addiction (CCSA), which said the risk of cancer rises at much lower levels of alcohol consumption than previously thought. Any more than two standard drinks a week puts people at higher risk, it said in its report.

However, Health Canada has not adopted the changes the CCSA released in January 2023. It still advises Canadians to limit their drinks to 10 per week for women and 15 per week for men — an amount that the CCSA says puts someone at “increasingly high risk” of developing serious illness, including breast and colon cancer.

Health Canada’s guide has been in place since 2011 and the government is sticking with it, the office of the federal minister of mental health and addictions told The Canadian Press Thursday.

Dr. Timothy Naimi, director of the Canadian Institute for Substance Use Research at the University of Victoria, said the conflicting guidance “has been an ongoing issue for the public health community and scientists” for the last two years.

Naimi was one of the researchers involved in developing the CCSA’s updated guidelines and led the creation of the new website — knowalcohol.ca — that allows people to calculate their risk and the positive impact of reducing their alcohol consumption.

Both the Health Canada and the CCSA guidelines say the only zero-risk approach to alcohol is not to drink it at all.