Health and Human Services proposed draft dietary guidelines that would have raised the amount of drinks consumed in one day for men and women to be considered moderate drinking. CADCA submitted comments, mobilized our members to comment, and CADCA’s comments were included in the final guidelines.

The Dietary Guidelines recently were published, and CADCA’s recommendations for moderate drinking were accepted.

The guidelines state the following:

If alcohol is consumed, it should be in moderation—up to one drink per day for women and up to two drinks per day for men—and only by adults of legal drinking age. For those who choose to drink, moderate alcohol consumption can be incorporated into the calorie limits of most healthy eating patterns. The Dietary Guidelines does not recommend that individuals who do not drink alcohol start drinking for any reason; however, it does recommend that all foods and beverages consumed be accounted for within healthy eating patterns. Alcohol is not a component of the USDA Food Patterns. Thus, if alcohol is consumed, the calories from alcohol should be accounted for so that the limits on calories for other uses and total calories are not exceeded (see the Other Dietary Components section of Chapter 1. Key Elements of Healthy Eating Patterns for further discussion of limits on alcohol and calories for other uses within healthy eating patterns).