The White Ribbon. “For God, and Home, and Humanity." WELLINGTON, MARCH 18, 1930. THE MENACE OF MEDICATED WINES.

White Ribbon, Volume 35, Issue 416, 18 March 1930, Page 7

The White Ribbon. “For God, and Home, and Humanity." WELLINGTON, MARCH 18, 1930. THE MENACE OF MEDICATED WINES.

Medicated wines are being very largely advertised, and much money is being spent on them. It is necessary to sound a warning note, and to let the public know how absolutely useless these so-called remedies are; nay, more, how harmful they are. Alcohol is a habit-forming drug, and in many homes where port ami sherry are forbidden, alcohol finds entrance as a medicated wine. It does its deadly work, and many a young life is mined by alcohol as a medicine. The British Medical Association certified that the volume of alcohol in cl iret was 9 per cent., in champagne 10 to 1 per cent., and in port wine 20 per cent The same Association also gave the volume of alcohol in various meat and tonic wines. To save space, only a few are given, and the heavy proj>ortion of alcohol in them constitutes a grave warning against their uses. Bovrll Wine Vibrona Wine Wincarnls Wine .... 19.6 Hall’s Wine ._ .... 17 85 Lemco Wine .... Most of these wines contained far more alcohol than champagne does, and bovril contains more than i>ort win*' The fact that they are advertised as tonics makes them more dangerous still. I>r. Mary .urge said: “A woman who has been a life-long ahstainer, and who, during illness, was advised by her do<-tor to take Winer*rnis became from that time a habitual and excessive lover of alcohol, and died a few months ago in consequence.” Prof. G. Sims Woodhead said: ‘Those wines are a most pernicious institution. and are doing an enormous amount of harm.” The declared: “The idea that beef can be combine! serviceably with wine is a delusion and a snare.” T>r W. T* Reid, who Is a past-Presi-dent of the College of Physicians and Surgeons, and is a specialist in gynaecology, being asked for his testimony upon the subject of medicated wines, replied in the following letter:

“In answer to your inquiry as to my experience of the so-called and muchadvertlsed medicated wines, perhaps the following notes may be of service. “As to the nature of these wines, most of them contain as much iflcohol as ordinary i>ort or sherry, viz, 20 percent. The other ingredients are so small in quantity as not deserving of mention. It Is significant that the Excise Authorities will not allow their sale without the usual license for ordinary intoxicating drinks. “The British Medical Journal’ of 27th March, 1909, contained detailed analyses of a number of these wines, such as ‘Bovril Wine’ and ‘Wincamis,’ and in a leading article in the same number said: ‘With regard to the meat wines, the chief objection on public grounds to their use is, that person . who might not otherwise bo disposed to take a glass of sherry or port at odd times during the day, may be induced to take a wine containing as much alcohol, because of the nourishing constituents which have been introduced into it by the addition of moat or malt, or l>oth. Without labouring the question whether the meat extracts can properly l>e called nutritious or not. it may be pointed out that by the use of these meat wines the alcoholic habit may be encouraged or established, and that it is a mistake to suppose that they possess any high nutritive qualities.’ “Samples of seven meat wines, including, it is believed, all those most extensively used in this country, have been submitted to analysis, and the detailed results will be found in the foregoing pages. It will be seen that in all instances the percentage of alcohol present approaches that commonly present in sherry or port. In the meat wine, stated to contain quinine, th° amount of that drug present must have *«‘en very minute, for it was too small to be weighed or identified. ‘That the fear al»ove mentioned is real, I can testify from actual experience, especially amongst young women The temporary exhilaration produced by alcohol is supposed by the consumer to be caused by the men* or malt in th * wine, but really by Its alcoholic content. and a.s this is followed by th rt usual depression, more ami more of tlv» ‘nourishing’ wine is consumed, and th • terrible alcoholic craving established. “But, short of this, much harm results from the advertisement and sab

of these wines. At the Westeren Infirmary I had frequently young women —sometimes mere girls—sent to me with nervous symptoms for which it was difficult to account. On investigation. it w r as found that these were due to the fact that half of their wages were spent on medicated wines, and th » attempt to keep in health on the other half. "A long experience in a large city leads me to lielieve that not a thousandth part of the evil caused by ‘medicated wines’ is ever known ’’