TEMPERANCE COLUMN.

Otago Daily Times, Issue 20291, 27 December 1927, Page 2

TEMPERANCE COLUMN.

[The matter under thiß heading i« published at the request o!, and is supplied bv the United Tomperance Relnrm Council iri pursuance if the desire to inculcate the • principles ol temperance.') THE RELATION OF ALCOHOL TO PHYSICAL DETERIORATION AND .NATIONAL EFFICIENCY. By W. AFAn.m Eccles, M.S. F.R.C.S. 11. TOXINS. It is a momentous fact that the cells of the individual may be damaged even before the child is born. Poisons—toxins —circulating in the mother's blood can pass, and often do pass, into the organism of the child. Alcohol is one of the poisons which may so invade the developing infant We know but little as yet ot the laws of heredity, but we do know the disease may be impressed upon the child before birth, and that a child may carry such an impress in a latent manner for long after birth, the resulting handicap to its welfare in the world becoming apparent only in many instances when some strain is thrown upon it. Then it is that the inherent defect shows its existence and the individual evinces that crave for alcohol which the normal brain might have been able to withstand. It is thus that a vicious circle of the most serious import may be brought into existence. A father or a mother or both parents are given to excessive indulgence in alcoholic beverages. Their offspring is affected, it may be quite insidiously, and they in their turn produce cleornci-atra one degree worse than themselves. ACTION OF ALCOHOL ON GROWING TISSUES. But a child of alcoholic parents may escape contamination before birth, only to be caught by the foe very soon after it enters the world. A nursing mother . who gives way to drink generally feeds her child with milk which is poor in quality and deficient in quantity. The amount of milk is not increased by alcoholic beverages, and there is no such thing as " nourishing stout of the greatest value to nursing mothers." Frequently the milk contains a very appreciable amount of the drug which the mother has been imbibing, for alcohol can be readily traced in the mother's _ milk within 20 minutes of its ingestion into her stomach, and it may be detected in it for as long as eight hours after a large dose. Dilute alcohol thu3 passed into the system of the child invades every part of its being, and has a particularly harmful effect upon the growing cells of ite developing brain. It is in this manner possible to pay the way for many degenerative lesions which are manifest in later years. Numerous cases have been reported in which infants at the breast have been the subjects of both acute and chronic alcoholic poisoning, the results of which have remained as permanent defects in the individual. It is on account of these well-known facts that many hospitals, in their hints which they issue to mothers on the rearing of infants, lay stress on the recommendation that alcohol should be avoided —a recommendation which is very different from the ordinarily accepted idea in the public mind. It is not only, however, that tho infant may receive alcohol mixed with tho natural food from its mother, but it is by no means unusual for alcohol to be administered to it apart from maternal milk. It is not an uncommon sight to see quite young children carried into the public-house and there treated to beer or even spirits. The child makes a wry face over its doso —evidence that alcohol is not a mi id appreciated by the Untutored palate. The fact ought to indicate to any but the most ignorant, that its proper use. is that of a drug rather than a beverage. This administration of alcohol is made, I verily believe, as tho result of maternal ignorance in most instances, an ignorance which does not redound to the credit of the educationists of our land. When a mother was recently remonstrated with for thus exposing her infant to danger, she was furious with, indignation, and her caustic remark wag, " Who are you talking to, , young man —to me as has buried six? " ALCOHOLIC MOTHERS. Women who are public-house frequenters are not only bad nurses but they are also bad mothers. How is it possible for a woman to be a mother in the truest sense when she is wretchedly fed because so i largo a proportion of the weekly earnings i go in drink, when she is thinly clothed j because tho pawnshop swallows up any j decent garment which may have been j dearly purchased, and when she is so , utterly careless of all her ways because her ; intellect and finer feelings are blunted by alcohol? And yet this is the condition of j thousands of so-called mothers in our largo cities and towns. Statistics carefully com- , piled show that the average spent on drink per week by each working-class family in I the land is no less than six shillings. If this amount goes on what, to say the least is not a necessity, how can there be enough left to provide adequate food, housing, and clothing for the parents and the children? It is an established fact that many thousands of families in London have not an income large enough to obtain for each member even that amount of food provided for tho ordinary pauper-inmate ot the workhouse, and how then can it bo justifiable for tho family to spend nearly one , shilling a day on alcoholic beverages? j OTHER FACTORS. j I am perfectly willing to admit that j poverty, bad housing, and all tho accom , panimente of a wretched environment lend their share in the production of the deterioration which exists, but I am convinced, by my own observations and by those of many another student of social economics, that at least 50 per cent, of the instanco.i of child deterioration due directly or indirectly to habitual intemperance in one or both parents. The statistics recently published concerning the height and weight of school children both in Glasgow and Edinburgh go far to prove the fact that life in one room means want of growth; and a single living room often means rent money spent on dr : nk. . j Investigation into tho homo environ- ! ment of 72.557 school children in Glas- | gow brought out some startling facts. | Taking the children of all ages from five to 18, tho average weight and height, classified according to tho number of rooms, was found to be as' follows: ROYS. Rooms. Height. Weight Inches. Pounds. 1 46.0 52.0 2 48.1 56.1 3 50.0 60.6 4 51.3 04.3 GIRLS. 'Rooms. Height. Weight. Inches. Pounds. 1 46.0 51.5 2 47.8 54.8 \ 3 49.6 59.4 i 4 51.6 C 5.5 , As the report states: "It cannot be an accident that boys from one-roomed homes should be 11.71 b lighter en an average than boys from four-roomed homes and 4.7 inches smaller. Neither is it an accident that girls from oneroomed homes are on the average 141 b lighter and 5.3 inches shorter than girls from four-roomed houses. The connection between drink and the one room is obvious." . Tho chances of a poor boy in kdinburg.i, in the struggle for existence, are assessed eloquently enough in the following tabic. In the middle classes he starts at 13 with , 841 bof clean and healthy bone and muscle; in the slums he must do his best ■ with 711 b. and an even chance that one i or all of his senses arc defective. Even ■ more significant, however, arc the : averages which show the comparative d.i velopment of the slum boy, according n- : his parents attempt to bring him un ;n > one, two, or three rooms: \ ■ AT FIVE YEARS OF AGE. fc Rooms Height. Weight. ■> Inches. Pounds. \ 39.9 .'54-0 •-> 4(i.-.: •"•'■'■> ?, 41.9 42.0 4 42.0 45.5 1 AT THIRTEEN YEARS <>F AGE. 1 Room" Height. Weigh! t Inches. J'onn.:i ~ fi!