Alcohol causes cancer at every level of drinking. Most people do not know it.
A 2025 US Surgeon General advisory put alcohol third among preventable causes of cancer. The global data show light drinking contributes too, not only heavy use.
The alcohol flush is a genetic warning light for oesophageal cancer, not just a red face
An inactive enzyme carried by an estimated 540 million people lets a carcinogen build up when they drink. In heavy-drinking carriers, oesophageal cancer risk runs many times higher.
Two January studies took apart the link between acid drugs and stomach cancer
An Israeli case-control study found an apparent fourfold risk that vanished once the year before diagnosis was excluded. A Nordic study of 17,232 cancers found no association at all.