LIQUOR INDUSTRY AND SCIENTISTS AT ODDS OVER ALCOHOL STUDY

A study of excessive drinking that appears in today's issue of The Journal
of the American Medical Association has started a saloon brawl of its own
between the authors and the liquor industry, with each side accusing the
other of manipulating the figures.

The study, by an institute affiliated with Columbia University, concludes
that half the alcohol purchased in the United States is sold to teenagers
or people who drink too much.

The study, which is the journal's lead article, is couched more as a
political statement than as a dry recitation of numbers. It ends with an
attack on the liquor industry, calling for higher taxes, antidrinking
publicity campaigns and tougher sentences for those who sell to minors.

It is accompanied by an editorial about the dangers of excessive drinking
and comes with endorsements from three former surgeons general and from
Betty Ford, the former first lady who founded the Betty Ford Center after
seeking help for her own drinking problem.

But even before it was released, mistakes in its methods began to appear.
The authors defended their conclusions, saying the mistakes were minor.

The study comes from the National Center on Addiction and Substance Abuse,
which is headed by Joseph A. Califano Jr., the secretary of health,
education and welfare under President Jimmy Carter.

Last year, a study from the same source had to be withdrawn and
recalculated after a statistical error was discovered that doubled the
estimate of how much of the nation's alcohol was drunk by teenagers.

In 1994, a study by the center said that 28 percent of adults on welfare
were impaired by drugs or alcohol; the Department of Health and Human
Services called it "seriously flawed" and said a more accurate estimate was
4.5 percent.

The center's definition of "excessive drinking" in the new study, anything
over two drinks a day, has been questioned. And the study, which blends
figures from several large federal surveys, also appears to use an
incorrect measure for how the government calculates the alcohol in a mixed
drink.

The authors said that their calculations actually used the correct figure,
1.5 ounces, and that the 1.2-ounce figure cited in the article was merely a
typographical error.

This year's study has been vigorously attacked by a liquor industry
lobbying group, which accused its authors of "manipulating data for
sensational headlines."

The authors denied that, and said they checked their calculations with the
federal agencies that produced the raw data and submitted them to a
prestigious peer-reviewed medical journal.

However, late yesterday, an official at the Centers for Disease Control and
Prevention said the study's authors took a C.D.C. survey of high-school
drinking and "inappropriately" assumed that everyone from 12-year-olds in
junior high school to 20-year-old college juniors had the same drinking rate.

The study's lead author, Susan E. Foster, defended her conclusions, saying
the amount of teenage drinking was probably even worse than she had
estimated, because other surveys had found that college students drank more
than high school students and because the C.D.C. survey left out the
military, high school dropouts and the homeless.

The alcohol consumed in the United States beyond two drinks a day by
adults, plus all drinks consumed by drinkers under 21, adds up to 50.1
percent of all the alcohol consumed, the study concluded.

Ms. Foster said the study's definition of excessive drinking as more than
two drinks a day was generous because some federal recommendations suggest
only one drink a day for women and people over 65.

The liquor lobbying group, the Distilled Spirits Council, argued that more
than two drinks a day with meals does not necessarily constitute excess and
said the study's figures could be used to conclude that half of all
teenagers drink 99 drinks a month, or three drinks a day.

"Half of all 12-year-olds aren't going to school with hangovers," said
Peter H. Cressy, the council's president.

Ms. Foster said that the Spirits Council used its figures incorrectly, and
that her study concluded that the half of all teenagers who drink average
46 drinks a month, more likely to be consumed in binge drinking. She said
that might be a low estimate.

In language reminiscent of attacks on the tobacco industry a decade ago,
the center called alcohol "a premier drug of abuse in America" and accused
the industry of underestimating the damage it does to society and of doing
little to prevent minors and drunks from buying its products.

Ms. Foster recalled that Mr. Califano, a co-author of the study, had been
attacked decades ago by the tobacco industry for pointing out the dangers
of cigarettes.

The editorial accompanying the study pointed out that heavy drinkers are
also likely to be heavy users of illegal drugs. Antidrug campaigners often
use a similar argument, implying that marijuana is a gateway to more
dangerous drugs.

The study said that under-age drinking was beginning earlier, reporting
that the proportion of children who began drinking by the eighth grade
increased 33 percent from 1975 to 2001. It also said that a child who
begins drinking before age 15 is four times as likely to become an
alcoholic than someone who starts at 21 or later.