alcohol
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With Dry January in full swing, several people are opting to abstain from alcohol for the entire month while others are employing a Damp January tactic and lowering the intake with lighter sips. U.S. Surgeon General Vivek Murthy is urging alcohol brands to add a warning label that drinking can cause cancer, prompting a new debate about the ingesting of adult beverages.
Surgeon General Vivek Murthy issued an advisory last Friday calling for warning labels to be placed on bottles of alcohol meant for drinking highlighting the cancer risk links. In the advisory, Murthy says that drinking can lead to the cause of seven types of cancer – mouth, throat, voice box, esophagus, breast, liver, colon and rectum.
In a statement, Murthy clarified his office’s findings.
“Alcohol is a well-established, preventable cause of cancer responsible for about 100,000 cases of cancer and 20,000 cancer deaths annually in the United States – greater than the 13,500 alcohol-associated traffic crash fatalities per year in the U.S. – yet the majority of Americans are unaware of this risk,” said U.S. Surgeon General Dr. Vivek Murthy. “This Advisory lays out steps we can all take to increase awareness of alcohol’s cancer risk and minimize harm.”
In the United States, around 100,000 alcohol-related cancer cases are active along with an annual total of 20,00 alcohol-related cancer deaths. The statement adds that many factors go into determining one’s cancer risks including biological, environmental, social, and economic factors. Currently, the standard of two drinks a day for men and one drink a day for women is considered moderate drinking and assumed to not bear any significant risks.
Congress would need to approve the warning labels and there would need to be quantifiable data findings to get this through the chambers. There has already been some resistance to the advisory by opinion writers who cover the health industry with one columnist suggesting that the same should be said of recreational marijuana.
With the incoming Trump administration, it isn’t known how much roadway this advisory will have with President-elect Donald Trump, who reportedly does not drink.
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Photo: Getty
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Rihanna’s New Year’s Eve celebration was extra special this year. She revealed she sustained from alcohol all of 2024.
As spotted on Page Six, the “We Found Love” singer admitted something very personal about her current journey. She posted a video of her New Year’s Eve vibes with her friends and family. After counting down the last seconds of 2024 she said, “Y’all, I didn’t drink all year! I didn’t drink all year.” The caption read, “New Year, New Me,” which further cemented her commitment. While her core fanbase was happy to hear that she avoided booze, she was met with plenty of jokes about her very much delayed new album. “Yeah you didn’t drop any music all year either,” someone wrote.
“I thought it was the countdown for the album drop,” a different follower commented. Another user named Lorenzo wrote, “We want an album forehead,” which apparently didn’t sit well with Rihanna. The “Diamonds” performer quickly responded to him saying, “Listen, Lorenzo, you ain’t cute enough to be calling me by my Black name, you dizzy f*ck!” The hilarious clapback was largely embraced with over 800 individuals responding with laughing emojis.
You can see the footage from Rihanna’s New Year’s Eve below.
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Time continues to prove that no idol is not without faults. Denzel Washington has revealed he battled alcohol abuse for a large part of his career.
The esteemed actor was recently profiled on Esquire Magazine. The feature chronicles his life as a youth in Mount Vernon, NY all the way up to his beginnings as a budding actor. This piece does a magnificent job of allowing Denzel Washington to tell his story in his own words. When discussing his very controversial loss to Kevin Spacey at the 2000 Academy Awards for the Best Actor Award (Denzel was nominated for Hurricane) he says he went home and drank. Denzel admits that the loss made him bitter and this was his way of hosting his own pity party.
He went on to detail how his love for wine eventually became a very bad habit. “Wine is very tricky. It’s very slow. It ain’t like, boom, all of a sudden. And part of it was we built this big house in 1999 with a ten-thousand-bottle wine cellar, and I learned to drink the best” he explained. When the cellar eventually thinned out he would call a local shop to have a pair of bottles personally delivered to his home. When asked by his wife why he would only buy two at a time he revealed this was his way of limiting himself. “Because if I order more, I’ll drink more. So I kept it to two bottles, and I would drink them both over the course of the day.”
Even though he was drinking heavily he says he never let it interfere with his profession. “I never drank while I was working or preparing. I would clean up, go back to work—I could do both” he explained. “However many months of shooting, bang, it’s time to go. Then, boom.Three months of wine, then time to go back to work.” Thankfully Denzel Washington saw the error of his ways back then and dropped the habit. He has since been clean and will make his ten year anniversary of sobriety in December.
You can read Denzel Washington’s story on Esquire Magazine here.
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Macy Gray continues to be an open book with little of what people think. She recently admitted that she uses cocaine and alcohol to relax.
As spotted on TMZ the Canton, Ohio native is a cast member on Surreal Life: Villa of Secrets. During the premiere of the reality television show the crew were invited to participate in an exercise that would help them relax. While their guide was explaining the benefits of “consciously over-breathing” the “I Try” singer made it clear that is not how she cures herself. “Oh God! I just don’t do the hippy sh*t” she explained to the show’s producer. “I live in LA, that’s hippy kingdom, but for healing that’s not how I do it.”
When asked to explain her method of healing she nonchalantly admitted she does a line and pairs it with a drink. “Like cocaine and a couple of shots. Get those edibles down my throat and I’m good, girl! You order me a pizza and I’m straight. I don’t need all that sh*t, I’m good” she replied. As expected the clip quickly picked up traction online and became a guilty pleasure to react to. “Macy Gray on this Surreal Life is giving me life. She’s so unintentionally funny, omg I’ve fallen in love with her” one user wrote on X, formerly Twitter.
For this season of The Surreal Life Macy Gray is joined by Chet Hanks, O.T. Genasis, and Kim Zolciak. You can see Macy’s candid response below.
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