ALCOHOL AS A MEDICINE

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXXI, Issue 21758, 24 March 1934, Page 15

ALCOHOL AS A MEDICINE

Sir, —On reading the brusque answer returned by the Hospital Board to an inquiry from the New Zealand Alliance regarding the consumption of alcohol at the hospital, one wonders if the good gentlemen who compose the board are aware that there is an old and worldwide controversy as to the medicinal value of alcohol. There is such a controversy among scientific men, whether the, board knows it or not, and it is ° n -°L Sfeat importance. Auckland mighty easily have made its little contribution of experience in this matter to the world-wide figures being gathered to show whether or not the medical profession is discarding alcohol as a medicine; but 110 doubt tlie facts will be well established without the help asked - Courtesy.

to the criticism voiced by the chairman of the Hospital Board 111 regard to the desire of the medical section of the XXth International Congress on Alcoholism to obtain data as to the use of alcohol as m, me d'cme in New Zealand hospitals. Ihe Rt. Hon. Lord llowallan, chairs one meeting, and Sir Humphry Rolleston, Bart., K.C.8., M.D etc a President of the Royal College" of Physicians, and physician to His Majesty the King, chairs another. I am sure these eminent men would not be parties to "a piece of impertinence." J-ne inquiry is not impertinence, but a desire for matter upon which to base conclusions. It is ten years now since Sir Humphry Rolleston wrote in the course of an article on "Alcohol in Medicine"—"From the buk of physiological investigations on the action of alcohol, it appears that alcohol is a depressant rather than a stimulant, and that its effects are more likelv to be injurious than'beneficial." The Western annn r spi ' London, which Jiandles a /ear, used in 1925 a total irnfl ' of , brand .y for patients. In 1 noo same hospital used only 25J0z., in 1928 only loz., and since 1929 none x ~a s, b een~ u se d, while the deathrate' fell from 8.«54 per cent to 4.42 per cent, being the lowest of any infectious diseases hospital in London County. O.he nurses going with the am?Qos nC i e - fr ° l ? l , thi , s hospital have since 1928 discarded the use of brandy or other alcoholic liquor. These facts are symptomatic of the change that has come over medical practice in regard to the prescription and use of alcohol in medicine. For example, the medical superintendent of one New Zealand hospital board writes that in 1932-33 the expenditure on alcoholic liquor * for patients was something over £3O, but that if alcohol had been administered during that time on the same scale as it was in 1920-21 the bill would have been £6OO. This kind of information has been furnished previously by all sorts of hospitals in Great Britain, other parts of the Empire and foreign countries, and it will be regrettable if the Auckland Hospital Board adopts an obstructionist attitude. " J. Mat/ton Muhbay. General Secretary, N.Z. Alliance.