Is the U.S. government trying to limit your booze intake or access? The short answer is no. So why do we keep hearing rumblings about something called the ‘neo-prohibition’ movement?
Last summer, rumors that the Biden administration wanted to limit American’s drinking began making headlines, particularly in conservative publications. At the root of the story were comments made by Dr. George Koob, the director of the National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism, to British tabloid The Daily Mail. Koob said that when the new Health and Human Services (HHS) and U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) dietary guidelines are announced in 2025, if the U.S. were to go in any new direction, it may follow Canada’s lead.
That statement refers to the recommendations made by the Canadian Centre on Substance Use and Addiction last January that adults cut their intake to two alcoholic drinks per week. The current U.S. dietary guidelines, revised every five years, recommend the same amount or less per day for men and one drink or less for women (sidenote: will the USDA also update their gender spectrum?)
Those recommendations emerged around the same time that the World Health Organization issued a statement that when it comes to alcohol consumption, there is no safe amount that does not affect health. Not a great month for Brand Alcohol.
The 2025 U.S. alcohol guidelines are currently undergoing review, though that process is separate from the 2025 Dietary Guidelines Advisory Committee, which has caused some in the alcohol industry to raise concerns about transparency. It should be noted that although the USDA guidelines have come under scrutiny before, it’s been specifically concerning the influence of the lobbying efforts of big alcohol and food. No one from the Biden administration has confirmed Koob’s suggestion (and the HHS or the USDA did not respond to inquiries from BevNet).
Moderation Versus Temperance Movements
For some, fears of a neo-prohibition or neo-temperance movement may be a symptom of the heightened sensitivity to imposed restrictions, whether real or perceived, in the wake of the pandemic. However, the rise of moderation trends and Gen Z’s sober tendencies are vastly different from temperance moments of the past that eventually pushed for legal restrictions.
There are some pushing for change: Created in 2020, The Alcohol Action Network describes itself as a nationwide network of alcohol prevention practitioners and researchers engaging in alcohol policy issues. But the organization, which did not respond to our request for an interview, faces the massive challenge of overcoming historical precedence. As a writer for The Atlantic put it, our last attempt at prohibition has taken the wind out of the sails of any major temperance movement for over a century.
The Adult Non-Alcoholic Beverage Association (ANBA) has a mission more reflective of modern trends, its goal is to help accelerate the growth of the adult non-alc beverage category. Any type of regulatory or policy positions that organization takes are to support ANBA members in growing their businesses and producing the best non-alc products on the market, said CEO Marcos Salazar.
“I don’t see any major sense of activism to prohibit alcohol sales,” said Salazar. “What I do see is more information coming out about the impact alcohol has on your body and with this information, people are making more intentional decisions on whether to drink alcohol or not.”
Much of the language coming from non-alc brands has positioned products as options for moderation, not sober living. The data also shows that most non-alc customers are also alcohol consumers: in fact, just as bar-goers are switching from full-proof cocktails to zero-proof options, across the board, over 94% of non-alc buyers are also purchasing alcohol-containing beer, wine, and spirits, meaning these buyers add more value to total alcohol according to NIQ.
But Dry January and Sober October, as well as the fast-growing cannabis and (albeit small) adult non-alc category have put the alcohol industry on the defensive at a time when BevAlc growth has slowed. Erlinda Doherty, a public policy expert and BevAlc consultant, points to the influence of those industries as well as the Surgeon General’s shifting view on cancer and alcohol as pressures that are leading stakeholders in the alcohol industry to “put together a more organized way to respond.” That new scientific studies have already and will continue to foster a wider shift in the perception of alcohol, is part of that narrative (despite the predictable response of papers emerging with opposite conclusions).
“There are several things that are concerning the industry that’s causing or can cause negative impacts on the marketplace,” Doherty said. “But what I’m mostly concerned about here is not so much people’s personal choices, but the government overreach or obscurity of these things.”
DISCUS president and CEO Chris Swonger said the group is following the nutritional guidelines issue “very closely” and supports “an unbiased, transparent and scientifically rigorous process in the review.”
But even if new nutritional guidelines lead to larger legislative shifts, it’s hard to imagine that the unintended consequences of last century’s “noble experiment” could be forgotten by policy makers—the loss of government tax revenues, the decline of restaurants and corruption. Also, bathtub gin martini just doesn’t have a great ring to it.