Health labels for alcohol?

Seattle Post-Intelligencer ^ | February 26, 2004 | JULIE DAVIDOW

[sarcasm]

The label tells of lush vines sprouting from rich soil, grapes heated by the sun and cooled by evening mists. You are transported to the rolling hills of the Napa Valley, the romance of rural France, the greenery of the Willamette.

Then it hits you: a reality check. Split that bottle of wine, and you're looking at 245 calories each.

Right now, the wine drinker's fantasy is untouched by calorie counts. Alcohol, unlike soda, lemonade and other bottled drinks, does not have to include calorie, serving size and ingredient information.

But a proposal to add that information to wine, beer and liquor would force consumers to confront the amount of caloric padding alcohol adds to their diets.

And that's as it should be, said George Hacker of the Center for Science in the Public Interest, one of two national consumer groups that petitioned the federal Alcohol and Tobacco Tax and Trade Bureau late last year to require more detailed alcohol labels.

"There's a lot of information about alcohol that consumers want to know and could benefit from," Hacker said. "It relates directly to our enormous public health concern about obesity and weight gain."

The proposed label includes alcohol content, calories, serving size, ingredients and dietary guidelines for healthy alcohol consumption. Proponents deliberately left off carbohydrates, vitamins and other information that might lead consumers to mistakenly equate alcohol with food.

"This is an alcohol facts label, not a nutrition facts label," Hacker said.

A final decision on the labeling proposal could take months, said Art Resnick, a spokesman for the alcohol and tobacco tax agency.

The alcohol industry has long been hip to weight-conscious drinkers looking for alternatives. Responding to the latest shift in dieting strategy, beer manufacturers have introduced low-carb beers. Alcoholic beverages that make health claims, such as low-carb and light beers, are required to print information backing it up on their labels, Resnick said.

Shae Richardson, a clerk at a state-run liquor store near the University of Washington, said otherwise weight-obsessed sorority girls prefer bottles of sugary, creamy drinks.

	See illustration showing sample calorie counts for some beverages.

Without a calorie label, there's no way to compare when shopping, said Richardson, 27, who makes a point of sticking with straight gin or vodka, which are relatively low in calories.

"I wonder if sales of some drinks would go way down" if calorie information were readily available, she said.

Michael Grover, 43, called the labeling proposal a bunch of hooey while surveying the beer aisle at a Queen Anne grocery store yesterday. Beer and wine are extras, treats like ice cream. Dieters shouldn't need labels to remind them of that, he said. "They should know better."

Affixing calorie labels to wine would spoil the experience for some wine drinkers and could diminish a bottle's appeal, said Stacie Jacob, spokeswoman for the Washington Wine Commission.

"The labeling, packaging and eye appeal of a bottle has a lot to do with sales," Jacob said. "Until consumers are demanding (calorie labels), I'm not sure it's necessary to go there."

In response to the proposal, some liquor companies are volunteering to add more detail to their product labels, if not supporting the idea of new government regulations.

"Theoretically, it could be good for us," said Paul Shipman, president of Red Hook Ale. There's a common misperception, he said, that microbrews are higher in calories than other beers.

Customers already can find calorie and other information about the beer by calling a telephone number printed on Red Hook bottles or visiting the company's Web site, Shipman said. "There's no attempt to keep this knowledge away from consumers."

[Texan5]

Yep-just more nanny state crap-I can't believe the number of posters here who can't understand the words "personal responsibility"-sorry, hand wringers, but I am NOT my brother's keeper, and neither is the government, period.

[Gabz]

Personally, I'm sick and bloody tired of it...........

[ZinGirl]

Contains 5 servings

not in my world. ;)

[Cantiloper]

Actually, to be in tune with proposed cigarette labeling, I think that roughly one half of the surface area of alcohol bottles should be devoted to carefully designed and suitably gory pictures of cirrhotic livers, accident victims with dismembered limbs, babies with Fetal Alcohol Syndrome, drunks lying in the gutter, battered spouses, and so forth.

In addition, while we should of course remove all depictions of drinking from television and eventually from books, we should also focus on movies. Many films currently without an R rating depict people drinking what appears to be alcohol, often from containers that appear to have brand names or typical brand coloring. This obviously needs to be stopped and someone needs to do something about it.

Next week I'll tackle the problem of carcass chewing in the media, the disgusting rending of the dead flesh of helpless deers, bunny rabbits, and ever so cute and cuddly cows by disgustingly smelly carrion eaters.

Ick... kissing a meater is like licking a corpse.

Sincerely,

Michael J. McFadden
Author of "Dissecting Antismokers' Brains"
http://www.Antibrains.com

[Great Dane]

And here I thought the anti's would go after twinkies first... wait a minute, they are doing that, gee.. the can handle two sins at the same time, must be all that good experience they got with us smokers.

[Old Professer]

The biggest problem with living in a society populated with people is that it is populated with people.