A new study shows that alcohol consumption is responsible for 20,000 cancer-related deaths in the U.S. each year and 3.5 percent of all cancer deaths.
"The relationship between alcohol and cancer is strong, but it not widely appreciated by the public and remain underemphasized even by physicians,"said Dr. Timothy Naimi in a statement, the study's senior author and associate professor of medicine at Boston University School of Medicine. "Alcohol is a big preventable cancer risk factor that has been hiding in plain sight."
The research for this study involved analyzing sales-based data per capita alcohol consumption as well as two national surveys that addressed alcohol consumption.The findings showed that the average amount of drinks per day for the group was 1.5 or less.
The drinkers in the group represented 30 percent of reported deaths.
And the percent of deaths continued to increase as alcohol consumption grew. It was determined that 48 to 60 percent of deaths were related to the people in the study who drank three or more alcoholic beverages a day.
"When it comes to alcohol consumption and cancers, clearly excessive drinking is the riskiest type of drinking," Naimi told CBS station WBZ Boston. "But when it comes to cancer, there is no safe level of alcohol consumption."
Breast cancer was determined to be the most susceptible in terms of alcohol consumption and researchers found that it was the most common drinking-related death among women.
And breast cancer alone made up 15 percent of all the alcohol-related deaths put together--6,000 deaths per year.
"The purpose of this study is not to stigmatize moderate drinking, and I apologize if this makes people feel bummed out," Naimi told Prevention. "But it is important for people to know that yes, alcohol is a carcinogen, and it does increase your risk. That's the bottom line."