People who drink alcohol should limit their intake to no more than two drinks per day for men and one drink a day for women.2 The recommended limit is lower for women because of their smaller body size and slower metabolism of alcohol. A drink of alcohol is defined as 12 ounces of beer, five ounces of wine,or 1.5 ounces of 80-proof distilled spirits. Alcohol consumption is an established cause of cancers of the mouth, pharynx, larynx, esophagus, liver, and breast.62,63 Alcohol consumption may also be related to increased risk of colon cancer.For each of these cancers, risk increases substantially with intake of more than two drinks per day.Alcohol consumption combined with tobacco increases the risk of cancers of the mouth,larynx,and esophagus far more than the independent effect of either drinking or smoking. Furthermore, regular consumption of even a few drinks per week has been associated with an increased risk of breast cancer in women. The mechanism by which alcohol is related to breast cancer is not known with certainty, but may be due to alcohol-induced increases in circulating estrogens or other hormones in the blood, reduction of folic acid levels, or to a direct effect of alcohol or its metabolites on breast tissue.64 Reducing alcohol consumption may be an important way for many women to reduce their risk of breast cancer.Some studies suggest that consuming the recommended amount of the vitamin folic acid can minimize the increased risk of breast cancer from