Cigarettes and Alcohol: Both Are Known to Cause Cancer—So Why Aren’t There Warning Labels on Alcohol Bottles?  

In 2020, Canadian Senator Patrick Brazeau, currently serving as an Independent Algonquin Senator, stopped drinking alcohol following a suicide attempt and a diagnosis of colon cancer. He began to educate himself about the dangers of alcohol.

“I was among the 75% of Canadians who were unaware at that time of the direct causal link between alcohol consumption and seven fatal cancers,” Brazeau stated.

This realization led him to introduce legislation in the Senate that would require alcohol producers to place cancer warning labels on their products. The bill appeared to be on track for a final vote this spring and subsequent passage to the House of Commons. However, in June, it was unexpectedly adjourned. To Brazeau, this delay suggests the alcohol industry’s significant influence.

Currently, South Korea is the only country that mandates cancer warning labels on alcoholic products. Nonetheless, global health authorities—including the World Health Organization and the U.S. Surgeon General—have called for product labels to inform consumers about the cancer risks associated with alcohol consumption.

According to a recent report by the Investigative Journalism Foundation (IJF), records they reviewed indicate that as efforts to communicate the alcohol-cancer link have increased, Canada’s alcohol industry has consistently fought against measures to present that information directly to consumers on warning labels.

Robert Solomon, an emeritus professor of law at Western University and the national director of legal policy for Mothers Against Drunk Driving Canada for 21 years, notes that the industry has historically opposed warning labels, particularly those related to cancer.

“The idea that alcohol is a known carcinogen is alarming,” Solomon said.

A study released earlier this year from the Center for Addiction and Mental Health revealed that alcohol causes more harm to the population than any other drug in Canada, including tobacco, opioids, cocaine, methamphetamine, and cannabis.

Research has demonstrated that the costs associated with alcohol consumption—impacting the healthcare system and the criminal justice system—far exceed the revenue generated from alcohol sales and taxation, by billions of dollars. A 2024 study conducted by the Canadian Institute for Substance Use Research found that this deficit reached a high of $6.4 billion in 2020.

The Verifiable Connection Between Alcohol and Cancer.

In the mid-1980s, the World Health Organization (WHO) classified alcohol as a Group 1 carcinogen, alongside tobacco. Research supported by the WHO, the U.S. Centers for Disease Control, and Health Canada has consistently shown that alcohol increases the risk of various types of cancer, including breast and colorectal cancers.

In Canada, alcohol is responsible for an estimated 9,500 new cases of cancer and nearly 4,000 cancer deaths each year, according to a study published in The Lancet this year (2026).

If this information seems new to many people, experts who study the alcohol industry assert that this is by design.

“It’s essentially a repeat of what we witnessed with the tobacco industry decades ago. They deny any link to harm from use and distort emerging evidence,” said Brandon Purcell, advocacy manager for prevention and early detection at the Canadian Cancer Society.

Approximately two-thirds of Canadians who consume alcohol are unaware that it causes cancer. Experts believe that warning labels are a crucial way to inform consumers of this risk.

“We are not adequately informing the public of the risks. Unfortunately, consumers are paying the price for that ignorance,” Solomon added.

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