New research links daily sugary-drink consumption with higher stomach-cancer risk and shows alcohol’s growing contribution to cancer deaths. Here’s what the evidence actually means—and what it doesn’t.
A soda with lunch. A sports drink after work. A beer at a family gathering.
For millions of Americans, these are ordinary parts of everyday life. But two new studies are putting familiar drinks under a different kind of scrutiny: cancer risk.
One study found that people who consumed at least one sugar-sweetened beverage a day had more than twice the risk of developing stomach cancer compared with people who rarely consumed them.
Another found that the number of U.S. cancer deaths attributable to alcohol more than doubled between 1990 and 2023.
Neither finding means that drinking one soda or one beer will give someone cancer. But together, the studies add to a growing body of evidence that some everyday habits can influence cancer risk—and that reducing exposure may matter.
A daily sugary drink was linked to higher stomach-cancer risk
Researchers at the Mass General Brigham Cancer Institute analyzed 112,284 adults participating in two long-running U.S. studies.
During decades of follow-up, 278 participants developed gastric, or stomach, cancer.
According to the Mass General Brigham study announcement, people who consumed at least one sugar-sweetened beverage per day had a 2.45-times higher risk of gastric cancer than those who consumed fewer than one serving a month.
Among women in the Nurses’ Health Study, consuming more than one such beverage per day was associated with a 3.04-fold higher risk.
The beverages included regular carbonated drinks, punch, lemonade and sports drinks. Researchers also found an association between higher total fructose intake and greater gastric-cancer incidence. Artificially sweetened beverages were not associated with increased gastric-cancer risk in the analysis.
The study does not prove that sugary drinks caused the cancers.
It was an observational study, meaning researchers examined existing drinking and health patterns rather than assigning people to drink sugary beverages. The researchers also had limited information about some important stomach-cancer risk factors, including H. pylori infection and family history.
Most participants were White, limiting the researchers’ ability to examine differences across racial and ethnic groups. The researchers say additional studies are needed to confirm the findings.
Why Latino families should pay attention
That limitation makes the Latino question particularly important.
Stomach cancer already affects Hispanic Americans at higher rates than non-Hispanic White Americans. The American Cancer Society’s stomach-cancer research identifies Hispanic Americans among the U.S. groups with higher stomach-cancer rates.
That does not mean sugary drinks explain the disparity.
The new study cannot establish that—and because the participants were predominantly White, it could not adequately determine whether the association differs among Latino communities.
But the finding adds another reason to look closely at preventable risk factors in communities that already face a higher stomach-cancer burden.
Parriva has reported on this broader pattern before. Cancer survival is improving nationally, but Latino families continue to face uneven cancer risks.
Alcohol’s cancer toll has also grown
The second study approaches the issue from a different direction.
Researchers at the University of Miami’s Sylvester Comprehensive Cancer Center analyzed more than three decades of U.S. data and found that alcohol-attributable cancer deaths increased from 11,361 in 1990 to 23,126 in 2023.
That’s more than a doubling.
The burden extended beyond liver cancer. Researchers identified alcohol-attributable deaths involving cancers including breast, colorectal, liver, esophageal, pancreatic, stomach, prostate and head-and-neck cancers.
The University of Miami study announcement reports that men and adults 55 and older experienced the greatest overall burden, while increases were seen across most cancer types, age groups and regions.
The study was published in The Lancet Regional Health—Americas.
But again, the headline number needs context.
It does not mean alcohol was responsible for every cancer death among people who drank. The researchers used population-level data to estimate deaths attributable to alcohol.
The broader science is already clear, however: alcohol is a known human carcinogen. The National Cancer Institute’s alcohol and cancer fact sheet says alcohol consumption is linked to several cancers, and risk generally increases as alcohol consumption increases.
One drink does not mean one cancer diagnosis
This is where cancer headlines can become misleading.
If a study reports a 2.45-fold higher relative risk, that does not mean a person has a 245% chance of developing cancer.
Relative risk compares one group with another. It does not tell an individual exactly what their personal probability of developing cancer will be.
The same principle applies to the alcohol findings.
A person who has one drink is not being told that cancer is inevitable.
The evidence instead points toward a broader public-health message: less exposure generally means less alcohol-related cancer risk, while frequent consumption of sugar-sweetened beverages may also be a modifiable behavior worth reducing.
The National Cancer Institute notes that alcohol increases the risk of several cancers and that the risk generally rises with the amount consumed.
What the studies don’t tell us
The new research does not establish that:
- one sugary drink will cause stomach cancer;
- sugary drinks explain higher stomach-cancer rates among Latino Americans;
- artificial sweeteners prevent cancer;
- one alcoholic drink guarantees a cancer diagnosis; or
- changing one behavior eliminates a person’s cancer risk.
Cancer is complicated. Genetics, infections, tobacco, weight, diet, age, family history, environmental exposures and access to prevention and treatment can all matter.
Parriva has also examined another side of that equation: colorectal cancer is rising among younger adults, with Latino communities experiencing one of the fastest increases.
What people can do with the information
The useful takeaway isn’t panic.
It’s awareness.
If you regularly drink sugar-sweetened beverages, replacing some of them with water or unsweetened drinks is a simple way to reduce consumption.
If you drink alcohol, understanding what counts as a standard drink—and recognizing that lower consumption means lower exposure—can help put the cancer risk in perspective. The National Cancer Institute provides detailed information about alcohol and cancer risk, including how alcohol consumption is measured and how risk changes with drinking patterns.
And cancer prevention involves much more than beverages.
Screening when recommended, avoiding tobacco, maintaining a healthy weight, staying physically active and discussing individual risk factors with a healthcare professional remain important.
The uncomfortable part of these studies is not that people suddenly need to fear every soda or beer.
It’s that cancer prevention can involve reconsidering things that have become so ordinary that we rarely think about them.
For Latino families, that conversation deserves particular attention because stomach cancer already carries a disproportionate burden.
The new sugary-drink study does not solve the mystery of why.
But it gives researchers another question to investigate—and gives the public another reason to think about what becomes routine in our diets.
The goal isn’t perfection.
It’s reducing risks where we can, understanding what the evidence actually says, and not allowing frightening headlines to substitute for good health information.
