Published: November 27, 2008 08:38 am            

Making brewers serve up facts | On labeling requirements, public health should prevail over politics

Since the mid-1990s, food companies have been required to include nutrition facts on the labels of all food products.

As I counsel my patients on diet and lifestyle choices, I have found these labels to be a useful tool in educating them in making better purchasing and consumption decisions.

When it comes to beer, wine or spirits products, however, there are no uniform labels to make it easier for consumers to compare products; only a patchwork of federal labeling requirements.

This could change in the near future.

The federal government, through the Department of Treasury’s Tax and Trade Bureau, is currently considering a proposal to make alcohol companies include a “serving facts” panel on beer, wine and spirits bottles similar to the “nutrition facts” panel on food packaging.

This is one of the most significant labeling initiatives for alcohol products undertaken in the past two decades.

As part of the federal rulemaking process, numerous public health organizations and consumers groups, including Mothers Against Drunk Drivers, a former secretary of agriculture, a former surgeon general, Consumer Federation of America and National Consumers League, have written comments urging the government to include standard drink information and the amount of alcohol per serving on the labels of beer, wine and spirits products – not just the amount of calories, fat, carbohydrates, and protein.

The bureau’s current proposed rule does not require that the “serving facts” panel inform consumers how much alcohol is in a serving of spirits, beer or wine.

It would even prohibit a company from including on that panel how much alcohol is in a standard drink, as defined by the U.S. Government’s Dietary Guidelines for Americans, the basis for nutrition policy in the United States.

Omitting this important information from the label is seriously misguided.

The Dietary Guidelines defines a standard drink as 12 fluid ounces of regular beer, 5 fluid ounces of wine or 1.5 fluid ounces of 80-proof distilled spirits; each contains 0.6 fluid ounces of alcohol.

This standard drink information is used by numerous federal and state agencies, including the Office of the Surgeon General, the National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, and in state driver’s manuals across the country.

Including on the label a simple definition of a standard drink and how much alcohol is in a serving would help consumers make responsible decisions and assist them in following the advice of the Dietary Guidelines on alcohol consumption.

The distilled spirits industry agrees with the public health community that knowing how much alcohol is in a serving of beer, wine or distilled spirits is a critical aspect of responsible drinking.

It has been nearly five years since dozens of national consumer and health organizations petitioned the Tax and Trade Bureau (TTB) to require standardized alcohol labels similar to those on packaged foods.

Consumers deserve better.

Whichever administration finally rules on the label, let’s hope our federal leaders choose public health over politics by requiring standardized “serving facts” labels with information about the amount of alcohol per serving and the definition of a standard drink.

Anything short of including this basic information on labels would be a failure of the regulatory process and would undermine decades of important health promotion encouraging responsible and moderate drinking.



Dr. Raymond Scalettar is the former chairman of the American Medical Association and is a medical adviser to the Distilled Spirits Council. He can be reached at (202) 331-1489.

        

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