GOVERNMENT OKS NEW WINE LABELS

Makers can tout `health effects'

WASHINGTON -- To your health! Maybe.

It all depends on which label you want to read on your wine bottle.

The federal government Friday approved changes that will allow winemakers
for the first time to tout on labels the connection between drinking wine
and better health.

The Treasury Department's Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms said that
from now on wine labels will be allowed to carry a non-specific reference to
the ``health effects'' of wine consumption based on studies in recent years
that suggest moderate drinking can lower the risk of coronary heart disease
in some individuals.

The architects of the change -- the $9 billion-a-year California wine
industry and its leadership in the San Francisco-based Wine Institute --
were jubilant, calling it a ``historic regulatory breakthrough.''

But the new regulation provoked the wrath of federal health officials, among
them Surgeon General David Satcher, who, in a letter last month to Treasury
officials, called alcohol abuse and alcoholism ``one of the most vexing
public-health problems'' in the United States.

Under the new rule, winemakers can immediately start putting either or both
of two statements on their wine bottle labels: ``The proud people who made
this wine encourage you to consult your family doctor about the health
effects of wine consumption,'' or ``To learn the health effects of wine
consumption, send for the Federal Government's Dietary Guidelines for
Americans.''

The changes will not replace current warnings on labels that declare that
drinking alcohol can complicate pregnancies and impair one's ability to
drive or operate machinery. The government's dietary guidelines define
``moderate'' as no more than one drink a day for women, and no more than two
drinks a day for men. A ``moderate'' serving of wine is five ounces.

The approval of the new wine label ``is not an endorsement by the U.S.
government'' to drink wine, said Edward S. Knight, Treasury's general
counsel. ``It only means we have not found the label to be false or
misleading.'' Knight said that Treasury ``had no legal basis to deny'' the
labels and that under the First Amendment, the companies had a right to use
the proposed labels as long as they weren't misleading.

Industry officials have been lobbying for three years for the right to put
new language promoting the health connection on their products. Originally,
winemakers sought wording referring to the health ``benefits'' of moderate
wine drinking, but backed off, revising it to health ``effects,'' to
increase the likelihood of approval.