Nearly six in 10 Americans, 58 percent, know that regularly drinking alcohol increases the chances of later developing cancer, according to a nationally representative survey from the Annenberg Public Policy Center. The figure is five percentage points higher than in February 2026, a statistically significant rise.
The survey, Wave 31 of the Annenberg Science and Public Health (ASAPH) survey, ran from September 22 to October 5, 2026, among 1,842 empaneled US adults. SSRS, an independent research company, carried out interviews by web and telephone using a nationally representative probability sample drawn from its opinion panel, with the data weighted to represent the US adult population. The margin of error is plus or minus 3.2 percentage points.
The current level is also 18 percentage points higher than in September 2024, when the center first asked the question and 40 percent recognized the link. In the February 2026 survey, conducted among 1,650 US adults, 53 percent said regular drinking raises cancer risk, 16 percent said it has no effect and 29 percent were not sure.
Alcohol awareness back near early 2025 level
The rebound brings public knowledge roughly back to where it stood in February 2025, when 56 percent of Americans recognized the link. That measurement came a month after Dr. Vivek Murthy, surgeon general under President Joe Biden, issued an advisory on the causal link between alcohol consumption and at least seven types of cancer, including breast, colon and liver cancer.
Headlines before the survey
The latest survey was fielded shortly after new research drew wide media attention. In September 2026, researchers at the University of Miami’s Miller School of Medicine published data showing that even moderate and small amounts of alcohol increased the risk of cancer. Headlines drawn from those data told readers that alcohol-related cancer deaths in the United States have more than doubled over three decades.
Laura A. Gibson, a research analyst at the Annenberg Public Policy Center, said it is not possible to draw a direct link between news coverage of the Miami study or the surgeon general’s warning and the growth in knowledge about alcohol and cancer. “We know that ongoing media coverage plays an important role in amplifying the general public’s awareness of health risks,” she said.
The surgeon general’s advisory also called for updated warning labels on alcoholic beverages, so that consumers would see the cancer risk at the point of purchase. Kathleen Hall Jamieson, director of the Annenberg Public Policy Center, said at the time that the data suggested the surgeon general’s synthesis of the science had gained traction. “Our data suggest that the Surgeon General’s synthesis of the science showing that alcohol consumption increases one’s risk of cancer got traction,” she said in a news release. “The Surgeon General’s impact is a reminder that what health officials communicate about science can affect behavior.”
Awareness was flat for a year before the latest rise. The February 2026 survey found recognition statistically unchanged from February 2025, even though the link between drinking and cancer risk had been left out of the new dietary guidelines published weeks earlier. The October result breaks that flat stretch, returning recognition to roughly the level recorded just after the surgeon general’s advisory.
Alcohol and the dietary guidelines
The February 2026 survey was conducted about a month after the US Department of Agriculture unveiled its 2025-2030 Dietary Guidelines for Americans on January 7, 2026. The earlier 2020-2025 guidelines warned that alcohol has been found to increase risk for cancer, and that for some types of cancer the risk increases even at low levels of drinking, defined as less than one drink in a day.
The new 2025-2030 guidelines call for limiting alcoholic beverages for better health, but they contain no mention of a link between alcohol consumption and cancer risk. Awareness of the link has still risen since the guidelines changed, with the October survey putting recognition at 58 percent. The center noted that the five-point rise since February was statistically significant, meaning it falls outside the survey’s margin of error, and the results were published on October 27, 2026.