Lawmakers cast doubt on experts weighing alcohol diet recommendations

aAlcohol policy researchers are outraged by a letter sent last month by members of Congress criticizing a panel of experts charged with assessing the health risks of drinking alcohol.

The letter reflects some of the tensions emerging as federal health officials revise dietary guidelines for Americans based on research, including mounting evidence of alcohol-related harms.

The ICCPUD, short for Interagency Coordinating Committee on the Prevention of Underage Drinking, is a two-decade-old group within the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services that oversees the dietary guidelines process. Instead of including alcohol in the normal guidelines process, HHS directed the ICCPUD to review the evidence on alcohol-related harms and report back to the guidelines authors. This is happening in addition to a separate panel, led by the National Academies of Science, Engineering and Medicine, that was created last year to study alcohol. Data from both panels will be used in developing the guidelines that set limits for low-risk alcohol consumption.