HUMAN TISSUES

Timaru Herald, Volume CLVII, Issue 23215, 31 May 1945, Page 7

HUMAN TISSUES

Alcohol A Potent Poison Medical View Stated (N.Z.P.A.) AUCKLAND, May 30. "No consideration of the licensing of the sale of alcoholic liquor can achieve anything unless it bears in mind and keeps bearing in mind the nature of the chief ingredient in the commodity which it licenses to make and sell,” said Dr. J. F. G. Richards in evidence before the Licensing Commission to-day.

Witness said the chief ingredient of alcohol was a potent poison to human tissues. It was not in itself a beverage or a drinkable substance at all. Undiluted it was to human tissues a poison and nothing but a poison. Diluted it was still a poison, the toxicity of which was inversely proportionate to the degree of dilution. The properties whicn made it attractive to those who drank it were its rudefacient effect on the lining of the stomach, producing an agreeable sense of warmth; its property of dilating the peripheral circulation, producing an agreeable sense of glow; and its property of removing from a slight to an increasingly greater extent those inhibitions and controls which civilised man has gradually built up to make his actions harmless to his fellows. “In its less developed form this produces a feeling of liberation from the constraints of modern life, giving a sense of freedom and enlargement. In suitable dilution alcohol produces these effects without any considerable development or recognition of the essentially toxic nature of the substance of alcohol which produces them, but the margin is small and can easily be overstepped. If the effects of alcohol could be maintained at this minimal level of toxicity its use in such quantities suitably diluted could be regarded as reasonable and allowable. A nice degree of judgment is necessary to determine the level at which the allowable poisonous effect of this substance is passed. It is clear, therefore, that if the well-being of the individual is at issue, that retailers of this substance should be highly trained in the capacity to judge the point at which this substance ceases to be a reasonable article of sale and at which it becomes a poison definitely harmful to the individual and, therefore, injurious to the State. Medical opinion of the poisonous nature of alcohol in any but minimal quantities is well established and irrefutable.”

Witness said that were highly trained were restricted in the sale of poisons, whereas alcohol for sale was put in the hands of persons who were not experienced.