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White Ribbon, Volume 1, Issue 12, 1 June 1896, Page 11

Alcoholism and Consumption in France. —At the last meeting of the Academie de Medicine, M. Lagneau said that the increasing frequency of phthisis in men is due in a great part to indulgence in intoxicating liquors. As a prophylactic remedy, the speaker proposed that the licences and taxes of all wine shops should be greatly increased. In Paris alone, in 1890, there were 29,583 drinking shops of every kind, or one to every third house, and each year this number is increased by 5,000. At the same meeting M. Magnan proposed, as a prophylactic measure against alcoholism, the creation of special asylums for the treatment of inveterate drunkards. He said that in Paris alone the progress of alcoholism was incredible ; in 1894, at the lunatic asylum, Sainte-Anne, nearly 40 per cent of the patients received were dipsomaniacs. Up to the present these persons were treated as ordinary lunatics, but it is certain that such treatment only attenuates, and sometimes cun s, the acute or subacute affecti ns produced by alcohol, withou'., however, modifying the passion for strong drink. Consequently, it seemed absolutely necessary to place dipsomaniacs in a special institution, where the surrounding influence would have a real moral effect on their propensities.—Medical Press.