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Less than half of Americans know that alcohol is a carcinogen

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Re: Less than half of Americans know that alcohol is a carcinogen

#131

Post by ogre_codes »

SoSoRoCoCo wrote: post #120
ogre_codes wrote: post #75

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think the labels are over the top. If you make people put big cancer labels on everything which causes cancer and ignore the relative risks of one versus the other, it is impossible to make a rational choice about the issue. Even a simple color guide would be a huge help.

> it is impossible to make a rational choice about the issue. I think this is over-reaching. I agree there should be a better system, but I am perfectly willing to do the work and research the warning. Thus, I am able to make a rational decision based on the best information I can find. As with all science, what is rational today may change as new information becomes available. THat is the price we pay to stay inform…

The current state of making everything share the same warning directly benefits the companies who sell the most dangerous chemicals.

This is literally the exact opposite outcome of what the measure is supposed to have.

Re: Less than half of Americans know that alcohol is a carcinogen

#132

Post by Balgair »

jrwoodruff wrote: post #96
echelon wrote: post #63

Rule of thumb : if your food, beverage, dye, or aromatic scent readily undergoes chemical reactions, it might not be safe. Alcohol is quite chemically reactive: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alcohol#Reactions Burnt or charred food has loads of polyaromatic hydrocarbons (PAH) that have lots of potential for chemistry (delocalized electrons = very reactive). They pose extreme cancer risk, and might be one of the most i…

I've never thought about it this way. Being very much not a chemist or biologist, are there any decent sources for reactivity of... commonly ingested things? Or any articles with more on this?

Reactivity is really hard to measure.

You'd have to specify the pressure and temperature first. Fine enough, human body fever temps to freezing, and then maybe a few atm to vacuum.

Then the really hard part comes in: you have to specify the reagents. Water, saline, air, ok. But the carcinogens really come in on all the ways the human body mixes with everything. You got all the enzymes, the buffers, the solutions, the biles and secretions, the hyper complex bio-chem that is a single pancreatic cell, etc.

I don't think such a matrix would be possible to report out without having a complete understanding of every human's biology in all it's strange wonderful forms.

Re: Less than half of Americans know that alcohol is a carcinogen

#133

Post by p1esk »

advisedwang wrote: post #51

Source for all the folks asking specifically about risks: https://www.cancer.gov/about-cancer/causes-prevention/risk/a... > an estimated 3.5% of cancer deaths in the United States (about 19,500 deaths) were alcohol related > Moderate drinkers have 1.8-fold higher risks of oral cavity (excluding the lips) and pharynx (throat) cancers and 1.4-fold higher risks of larynx (voice box) cancers than non-drinkers, and heavy…

Is this risk proportional to the strength of the alcohol you consume? I imagine a shot of 40% whiskey would be much worse for your throat than a bottle of 5% beer, despite the same total amount of alcohol.

Re: Less than half of Americans know that alcohol is a carcinogen

#134

Post by rriepe »

rcoveson wrote: post #107
rriepe wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Everyone I know who drinks considers one or two a day to be healthy.

The CDC defines "moderate alcohol consumption" as one drink per day for females and two drinks per day for males. That's probably what they're referring to. It also states: "This definition refers to the amount consumed on any single day and is not intended as an average over several days."[0] I don't see any info about weekly consumption. 0. https://www.cdc.gov/alcohol/faqs.htm

Nah they're referring to the media meme that a drink or two per day is good for you. Not not bad for you, but actively good for you.

Alcohol's poison at worst, empty calories at best.

Re: Less than half of Americans know that alcohol is a carcinogen

#135

Post by autocorr »

echelon wrote: post #63

Rule of thumb : if your food, beverage, dye, or aromatic scent readily undergoes chemical reactions, it might not be safe. Alcohol is quite chemically reactive: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alcohol#Reactions Burnt or charred food has loads of polyaromatic hydrocarbons (PAH) that have lots of potential for chemistry (delocalized electrons = very reactive). They pose extreme cancer risk, and might be one of the most i…

Another fun fact, polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs or "paws") are commonly observed in interstellar space and a substantial reservoir of carbon overall!

The 3.6 micron band from the IRAC camera on the Spitzer space telescope has a strong PAH flourescence feature in the band (absorbs UV, emits vibrational mode IR). The 3.6 micron wavelength is commonly colored green in composites, so if you see lots of green nebulosity in images from Spitzer, those are likely mainly PAHS.

Re: Less than half of Americans know that alcohol is a carcinogen

#136

Post by 08-15 »

echelon wrote: post #63

Rule of thumb : if your food, beverage, dye, or aromatic scent readily undergoes chemical reactions, it might not be safe. Alcohol is quite chemically reactive: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alcohol#Reactions Burnt or charred food has loads of polyaromatic hydrocarbons (PAH) that have lots of potential for chemistry (delocalized electrons = very reactive). They pose extreme cancer risk, and might be one of the most i…

> Alcohol is quite chemically reactive

Every single reaction listed there involves a violently reactive partner: sodium, phosphorus tribromide, concentrated hydrochloric acid, you know, the stuff you ingest daily. Even the esterification needs a strong acid as catalyst.

> carbs are much less dangerous

Fun fact, carbohydrates have multiple alcohol groups and are in fact more reactive than ethanol. They actually react with proteins, even without the help of enzymes, while ethanol doesn't.

Something about your logic doesn't add up.

Re: Less than half of Americans know that alcohol is a carcinogen

#137

Post by kevinskii »

dekhn wrote: post #126
kevinskii wrote: post #122

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The goal shouldn't be to get people to do what you want. It should be to give them sufficient information so they can make an informed decision on their own, even if you might disagree with it. I'm not suggesting that personal liberty should trump SARS-Cov-2 precautions, but it's not really relevant to a discussion about whether risk should be framed in absolute terms or not. (Edited for clarity.)

I disagree for a simple reason: while liberty is a great goal, if the liberty comes at a cost to the commons, it needs to be restricted. For example, as much as I'd love to let people chose to smoke and die of cancer, smoking affects a lot more than just the smoker. Alcohol DUIs leads to many driving deaths.

The OP suggested that risk shouldn't be communicated in absolute terms because people can't be trusted to make sound decisions. Presumably it's therefore better to only share relative risk numbers, which are almost always more frightening.

That's what I was responding to. I probably agree with most of your views on personal liberty versus the common good, but I think it's tangential to the original point about risk communication.

Re: Less than half of Americans know that alcohol is a carcinogen

#138

Post by SoSoRoCoCo »

ogre_codes wrote: post #131
SoSoRoCoCo wrote: post #120

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> it is impossible to make a rational choice about the issue. I think this is over-reaching. I agree there should be a better system, but I am perfectly willing to do the work and research the warning. Thus, I am able to make a rational decision based on the best information I can find. As with all science, what is rational today may change as new information becomes available. THat is the price we pay to stay inform…

The current state of making everything share the same warning directly benefits the companies who sell the most dangerous chemicals. This is literally the exact opposite outcome of what the measure is supposed to have.

Not following. Are you're saying this is "Gish Gallop" tactic [1]: flood your opponent with so much BS they can't possibly respond?

If so, I see what you are saying: the same level warning for thalidomide vs. something less deadly is a problem. If everything is bad, the bad guys sneak by?

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gish_gallop

Re: Less than half of Americans know that alcohol is a carcinogen

#139

Post by snazz »

adamhowell wrote: post #108
snazz wrote: post #79

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Does arsenic usually cause cancer or is it toxic in another way? While you can also get alcohol poisoning, this seems like an imperfect comparison.

I wasn't being facetious, I was just referencing the American Cancer Society's list: https://www.cancer.org/cancer/cancer-causes/general-info/kno... Arsenic is considered a carcinogen: https://www.cancer.org/cancer/cancer-causes/arsenic.html

I understand that arsenic is a carcinogen, but my one minute of research suggests that it's usually/often more of a poison. There's also some difference between organic and inorganic variants that I don't quite understand.

Re: Less than half of Americans know that alcohol is a carcinogen

#140

Post by ezoe »

easton wrote: post #88
throwaway09223 wrote: post #76

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, prop 65 is absurd. Pro 65 among other things requires labels on: * Parking garages * French fries - https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/mcdonalds-acrylamide-warni... (This sign is real; the McDonald's by my house has one) * Toast * Seaweed * Coffee has been a battleground: https://www.consumerproductslawblog.com/2019/06/what-now-cal... * Sand You would be hard pressed to find something that prop 65 does not requir…

The most comical one of these I know of is Disneyland’s, which I can only assume to be warning about cancerous IP law ;) https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/7/7d/Disneyla...

So... are we suppose to consume... Disneyland? Like... with a knife and fork?
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