SCIENCE / MEDICINE : Beer, Oral Cancer Link Detected

Heavy beer drinkers are twice as likely to develop cancer of the mouth than those who drink hard liquor, but both groups face a far greater cancer risk than non-drinkers, a researcher said last week.

All people who regularly consume large amounts of alcohol face an increased risk of oral cancer. But Dr. Arthur Mashberg said his research found the problem appears to be more severe among beer drinkers.

A study of military veterans showed those who drank six ounces or more of hard liquor daily had 10 times greater rates of cancer of the mouth than non-drinkers, Mashberg said.

But among those who drank six or more cans of beer a day, the cancer rate rose to 25 times that of non-drinkers, Mashberg said at an American Cancer Society seminar.

Although the link between alcohol and oral cancer has long been known, Mashberg said research previously has not drawn a distinction between hard liquor and beer.

It is not known why beer seems to be more harmful than hard liquor, said Mashberg, of the Veterans Administration Medical Center in East Orange, N.J.