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There has been this societal whip lash where alcohol has gone from being 'good for you' to being 'poison' over the last few years.

While it is true that any amount of alcohol is technically bad for you, 'the dose makes the poison'. Drinking in moderation is relatively harmless. For example, 2 drinks / day raises one's risk of colon cancer by 6%, but that's a relative increase on top of one's ~ 4.4% lifetime risk (which also includes drinkers, so we could be double counting). So you're increasing lifetime risk to 4.7%. Do it for all cancers and you're likely increasing your total risk of death by ~ 1%. Things really only go exponential beyond ~ 20d/wk

So you have to ask yourself, is your enjoyment of the occasional beer worth the very low increased risk? For myself, the answer is yes, but I would not dream of making that decision for someone else, and I object to the government doing it for me.

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