ALCOHOL AND EFFICIENCY

Otago Witness, Issue 3576, 26 September 1922, Page 25

ALCOHOL AND EFFICIENCY

VIEWS OF MEDICAL MEN. EFFECT ON OFFSPRING. THE FOOD VALUE OF BEER. (From Our Own Correspondent.) LONDON, August 4. Alcohol as a beverage was the chief topic for discussion at the closing session in Glasgow of the British Medical Association. The debate took place in public under the anpices of the Medical Sociological Section. The text of the discussion was: “To what extent, if any, can alcohol, as a beverage, be considered to have an influence on the human economy, mental disorders, industrial efficiency, and infant mortality?” At the close it was resolved, “That the Council of the British Medical Association be requested to assist in the promotion of further inquiry into the effect of aLcohol taken as a beverage on the individual arid on the community.” Dr E. R. Fothergill (Hove), in the chair, said the association had decided that they should have amongst their sections one in which the laity interested in social problems might meet with the medical profession and discuss tile matter from both points of view. What they wanted was a statement based on facts, not a dissertation on prohibition. CLAIMS OF PROHIBITIONISTS. Professor E. Mellanby (Sheffield), dealing with the action of alcohol on the human economy, said that alcohol must be classified as a food drug, and its most important action as a drug depended upon its power to modify the functions of the nervous system. Alcohol was a popular beverage because of its property of inducing changes in the nervous system, which were the basis of the altered sensations and outlook. Probably more striking still was the action of alcohol on the emotions, because the emotions were now regarded as being controlled by the cerebral cortex. A man under the influence of alcohol was a man whose emotions were dominant. As a result there came out in him what might be described as his “natural” qualities. If talkative he became garrulous, it dull he became duller. The laboratory could not pronounce whether alcohol was a good factor in sociology from the point of its action on the nervous system, but it was perfectly certain that we were all far too worried in this world, and there was nothing like alcohol for doing away with worry. Self-con-sciousness and self-criticism were depressed by alcohol, and for this reason alcohol might make apparently ordinary people talk iri a clever and interesting way, and shy people bolder. As a food it" was now recognised that its properties could be made use of to the best purpose in diabetes mcllitus. He had seen no evidence that there was any truth in the popular belief that mixed drinks bad special intoxicating properties, except so far as more of each beverage plight be drunk nr the overage concentration of alcohol increased. It was most striking the extent to which milk could modify or eliminate the worst symptoms of intoxication. THE PROBLEM OF HEREDITY. I>r ,1. T. MacCurdv (Cornell University) said that no one imagined that when prohibition was passed all alcohol would spontaneously evaporate. Moreover, the possession of liquor was not banned, and if a

guest from this country were given a cocktail before dinner he had no right to assume that any law had been broken. Nevertheless, it would be foolish to claim that there was no illicit traffic. There was probably much less alcohol consumed now than ever there was, and even if more insobriety were observed in certain social sets, there were fewer drunken people jn the streets and hospitals. Prohibition enthusiasts were prone to claim that the abolition of alcohol as a beverage would cause no one any harm and prevent all the misery now laid at the door of inebrity. If alcohol did nothing for the drinker except harm him their claims would be justified, but their unsound reasoning did not prove that prohibition Was undesirable No one, he fancied, was wise enough to say whether the gain of prohibition would be greater than the loss. We lived in an imperfect world, imperfect because we had not yet gained the capacity to govern our own instincts. Alcohol was a crutch that man had discovered to help him with this disability. When a man was tired or oppressed with care, how could he forget his anxieties or his self-conscious-ness sufficenty to become sociable? If he be normal, a small amount of alcohol would give the necessary relaxation. Conviviality was more important for the maintenance of mental stability and effectiveness than we realised. Concerning the problem of heredity, the experience of any physician showed that the alcoholic was not fecund, nor did his progeny thrive, ' if we are to look on this matter dispassionately,” be said, “can w« avoid the question, ‘ls this good or ban?’ There can be no doubt it is bad for society in any generation. The production of defective, badly nurtured and reared offspring inevitably throws a burden on society. But there is the race to consider. Eugenics exist in name only. If the true alcoholio be a psychopath, is .’t well to let him reproduce? Assuredly not. V\hat we ought to do is actively to prevent it, which sentimentality forbids. Alcohol eliminates the unfit. If we fail to treat the race with intelligent care, should we prevent Nature from working her way, albeit it is blind, slow, and unkind?” “A WEED KILLER.” dealing with the pathological effects of aloohol on different individuals, Sir F. Mott (pathologist to. the L.C.O. Asylums) held Jt was not surprising that alcoholism %va s responsible for a large proportion of crimes of violence. It might be ask.d bow it was that many chronic alcoholics in all stations of life were such skilled workmen and artists. Even the elementary feelings of right and wrong might be lost, and the aesthetic sense might remain. Thus a chronic alcoholic artist might by his conduct be anti-social and yet still delight the public by his art. It was sometimes brought forward as an argument in favour of the use of aloohol that some of the greatest artistic geniuses had used it, even to excess, but poets wore born, not made, and their poetic imagination persisted .n spite of alcohol. Rather than being a cause of insanity it was a revealing cause of incipient insanity. For that reason ; t could be described as a weed killer in the sense that it brought that class of case into the asylums earlier. There had been recently a reduced number of “drunks” coming into the hospitals, and he believed the decrease in drunkenness was to some extent due to the fact that there were so many excellent cafes and tea rooms. ENERGY v. EFFICIENCY. Professor E. L Collis (University of Wales), dealing with the effect of alcohol on industrial efficiency, remarked that this country depended upon her industrial efficiency. All evidence pointed to this efficiency being materially affected by alcoholic habits. The time was not far distant, if not now with them, when in the interests of efficiency they might be compelled, if those habits were not brought within temperate limits, to follow the example of America. Dr J. W. Ballantyne (Edinburgh) dealt with the evil effects of alcohol upon infantile mortality and still births. Professor R. Stockard (Embryologist of Cornell University) had carried out a long series of experiments with certain species of eggs, and with guinea pigs, but they gave no certain proot that alcohol was likely to cause abnormal development in the human emoryo. Professor A. 11. Cushny (Edinburgh), who maintained that alcohol had some ’ food value, said the body was able to use alcohol as a source of energy, just as an engine was able to use coal, us a source of energy. That did not mean, however, that alcohol was a desirable or commendable food. Green apples were quite as capable of giving energy to the litxly, but the public mind was still in doubt as to whether they were good food or bad food. The small boy was inclined to regard them as good food.—(Laughter.) The adult noticed their disadvantages.—(Laughter). Alcohol gave energy but weakened efficiency, and its value as food had been greatly exaggerated in recent years. A good ordinary pre-war beer was equivalent in food value, pint for pint, to a freely sweetened coffee or tea containing milk. The Rev. C. Weeks (Beckenham), who declared, himself in effect as an out-and-out. prohibitionist, described alcohol as one of the most destructive and deteriorating influences, and urged that everything should be done to wean the people from the disastrous hold which alcohol had obtained. CUTTHROATS AS TEETOTALLERS. The remark of Sir James Barr (Liverpool) that a largo amount of the social and industrial unrest of the present day was due to the high cost of aloohol, caused come laughter, and it was renewed when Sir James said that he observed that the cut-throats in Ireland and Russia were largely teetotallers. From the social point of view he would be sorry to see the use of alcohol in moderation abolished in this country. Dr J. Chalmers (Sunderland) remarked ho had no great reason to question the statement that alcohol, well-diluted and taken with food, aided digestion Personally. he was an abstainer because that gave him greater efficiency and better health than did indulgence. Dr SuiiiVan (Broadmoor Asylum) has come to the conclusion that alcoholic excess was due in the main to environment and industrial conditions, that only in a small minority of instances was alcoholism a factor in the causation of insanity, but that alcoholism was a potent cause of grave social conduct uue to its general action on an unsound body reflected in an unsound mind. EFFECT TN DENMARK. Dr M. llindhede (Copenhagen) told how under the war rationing system in Denmark, which included the restriction of alcohol, 1 lie death-rate of the whole countrv dropped from 12.5 to 10.4 per thousand,

which was the lowest mortality figure that ha.. ever been registered in any European countrv. The weak point in the conclusions. he admitted, was the fact that the Danish people not only restricted their alcohol consumption, but changed their entire mode of living. Professor Louise MTlroy (London University) said it was utterly impossible for an alcoholio woman to have a healthy child. CHARACTER AND ENVIRONMENT. The resolution having been adopted the Chairman, in his closing remarks, said that it seemed to him there were two classes into which the social reformers interested in this question could be divided. There were tho-.e who concentrated on the individual, and those who concentrated on the surroundings of the individual. In other words, those who were interested in the environment of the individual character and those who were interested in the environment of circumstances. The medical profession of necessity naturally tended to join the latter class.