Skip to main page content
U.S. flag

An official website of the United States government

Dot gov

The .gov means it’s official.
Federal government websites often end in .gov or .mil. Before sharing sensitive information, make sure you’re on a federal government site.

Https

The site is secure.
The https:// ensures that you are connecting to the official website and that any information you provide is encrypted and transmitted securely.

Access keys NCBI Homepage MyNCBI Homepage Main Content Main Navigation
. 2025 May 1;392(17):1752-1759.
doi: 10.1056/NEJMsr2413289.

The IARC Perspective on the Effects of Policies on Reducing Alcohol Consumption

Affiliations

The IARC Perspective on the Effects of Policies on Reducing Alcohol Consumption

Susan M Gapstur et al. N Engl J Med. .
No abstract available

PubMed Disclaimer

Conflict of interest statement

Before and during their participation, all Working Group members were required to provide Declarations of Interest. Upon review by the International Agency for Research on Cancer, none of the interests declared by the Working Group members was considered to represent a potential or significant conflict of interest with respect to their activity for the work.

Figures

Figure 1.
Figure 1.. Schema for the development of IARC Handbooks Volumes 20A and 20B.
This figure is updated from IARC Handbooks Volume 20A. Panel A shows the two-step evaluative framework from which, for scientific reasons, the level of evidence that an intervention prevents cancer is established by way of an intermediate outcome, as described in the IARC Handbooks of Cancer Prevention Preamble for Primary Prevention. In this framework, the intermediate outcome is defined as a change in exposure (decrease in exposure to an established cancer risk factor or increase in exposure to a cancer-preventive factor). In Step 1, the effect of a specified intervention on the intermediate outcome is evaluated. In Step 2, the effect of the intermediate outcome on cancer incidence in humans is evaluated. If it has not yet been established in authoritative sources that the intermediate outcome reduces cancer incidence in humans, Step 2 is conducted before Step 1. Panel B shows the development of IARC Handbooks Volumes 20A and 20B. Because the evidence that reduction or cessation of alcohol consumption reduces cancer incidence in humans had not been evaluated before, such evidence was reviewed and evaluated first. Then, the evidence that selected population-level alcohol policy interventions reduce alcohol consumption was reviewed and evaluated (IARC Handbooks Volume 20B, in preparation).

References

    1. Personal habits and indoor combustions. Vol 100E of IARC monographs on the evaluation of carcinogenic risks to humans. Lyon, France: International Agency for Research on Cancer, 2012. (https://publications.iarc.fr/122). - PMC - PubMed
    1. Rumgay H, Shield K, Charvat H, et al. Global burden of cancer in 2020 attributable to alcohol consumption: a population-based study. Lancet Oncol 2021;22:1071–80. - PMC - PubMed
    1. World Health Organization. Global strategy to reduce the harmful use of alcohol. 2010. (https://www.who.int/publications/i/item/9789241599931). - PMC - PubMed
    1. IARC Handbooks of Cancer Prevention: Preamble for primary prevention. Lyon, France: International Agency for Research on Cancer, October 2019. (https://handbooks.iarc.fr/documents-handbooks/hb-preamble-primary-preven...).
    1. Reduction or cessation of alcoholic beverage consumption. Vol 20A of IARC Handbooks of Cancer Prevention. Lyon, France: International Agency for Research on Cancer, 2024. (https://publications.iarc.who.int/638).

LinkOut - more resources