I stared at my phone in disbelief at what I was seeing. In the image, a wine bottle with a sticker on it saying that $2 from every bottle of this special edition rosé was going to help fund breast cancer research. or signup to continue reading The friend who sent it to me was a breast cancer survivor and had recently celebrated the all-clear after a long battle and gruelling treatment.
We both wondered, why, , was this charity raising funds from selling rosé? And should big alcohol be able to simply "pink wash" their products with cancer research support when the research clearly points to alcohol as a risk factor to breast cancer? More and more research is coming to light showing the link between alcohol consumption and breast cancer. The risk of breast cancer increases with each unit of alcohol consumed per day. A research paper from the national library of medicine states "an approximate 30-50 per cent increase in breast cancer risk from 15-30 grams per day of alcohol consumption" - that's about one or two drinks per day.
In 2021 the World Health Organisation stated breast cancer had become the most common cancer globally and concluded reducing alcohol consumption could greatly reduce its risk. Then there is the fact most women don't know alcohol increases their risk of breast cancer. How could they, when there is no broad health campaign to spread this knowledge, and cancer research stickers appear on the front of their bottles? A study from a leading Melbourne Univer.