Alcohol: A Dangerous and Unnecessary Medicine, How and Why - Martha Meir Allen (readict books txt) 📗

Introduction5

Preface to Second Edition7

CHAPTER I.
History of the Study of Alcohol.

Discovery of distillation--First American investigator of effects of alcohol--Medical Declarations--Sir B. W. Richardson's researches--Scientific Temperance Instruction in American Schools--Committee of Fifty9

CHAPTER II.
The Woman’s Christian Temperance Union
in Opposition to Alcohol as Medicine.

How the Opposition began—Memorial to International Medical Congress—Origin of Medical Temperance Department—Objects of the department—Public agitation against patent medicines originated by the department—Laws of Georgia, Alabama and Kansas on Medical prescription of alcohol21

CHAPTER III.
Alcohol as a Producer of Disease.

Alcohol a poison—Sudden deaths from brandy—Changes in liver, kidneys, heart, blood-vessels and nerves caused by alcohol—Beer and wine as harmful as the stronger drinks—Alcohol causes indigestion—Other diseases caused by alcohol—Deaths from alcoholism in Switzerland28

CHAPTER IV.
Temperance Hospitals.

The London Temperance Hospital—Methods of treatment—The Frances E. Willard Temperance Hospital, Chicago—“As a beverage" in the pledge—Address by Miss Frances E. Willard at opening of hospital—The Red Cross Hospital—Clara Barton and non-alcoholic medication—Reports of treatment in Red Cross Hospital—Use of Alcohol declining in other hospitals37

CHAPTER V.
The Effects of Alcohol Upon the Human Body.

The body composed of cells—Effect of alcohol on cells—Alcohol and Digestion—Effects on the blood—The heart—The liver—The kidneys—Incipient Bright’s disease recovered from by total abstinence—Retards oxidation and elimination of waste matters—Lengthens duration of sickness and increases mortality58

CHAPTER VI.
Alcohol as Medicine.

Medical use of alcohol a bulwark of the liquor traffic—Alcohol not a Food—Alcohol reduces temperature—Food principle of grains and fruits destroyed by fermentation—Alcohol not a Stimulant—Experiments proving this—Alcohol not a tonic—Professor Atwater on Alcohol as Food96

CHAPTER VII.
Alcohol in Pharmacy.

Strong tinctures rouse desire for drink in reformed inebriates—Glycerine and acetic acid to preserve drugs—Non-alcohol tinctures in use at London Temperance Hospital—Sale of liquor in drug-stores condemned by pharmacists131

CHAPTER VIII.
Diseases, and Their Treatment Without Alcohol.

Alcoholic Craving—Anæmia—Apoplexy—Boils and Carbuncle—Catarrh—Hay-Fever—Colds—Colic—Cholera—Cholera Infantum—Consumption—Displacements—Debility—Diarrhœa—Dysentery—Dyspepsia—Fainting—Fits—Flatulence—Headache—Hemorrhage—Heart Disease—Heart Failure—Insomnia—La Grippe—Measles—Malaria—Neuralgia—Nausea—Pneumonia—Pain After Food—Snake-bite—Rheumatism—Spasms—Shock—Sudden Illness—Sunstroke—Typhoid Fever—Vomiting140

CHAPTER IX.
Alcohol and Nursing Mothers.

Beer not good for nursing mothers—Helpful diet—Opinions of medical men—Analysis of milk of a temperate woman—Of a drinking woman—Advice of Dr. James Edmunds, of the Lying-In Hospital, London—How to feed the baby—Case of a young mother who used beer—Nathan S. Davis on beer and gin234

CHAPTER X.
Comparative Death-Rates With and Without the Use of Alcohol.

Fewer deaths in smallpox hospitals without alcohol—200 cases of scarlet fever without alcohol—Non-alcoholic treatment of fevers with less than 5 per cent. death-rate—Report of cases in English and Scotch hospitals—340 cases of typhus—London Lancet articles on typhoid—Mercy Hospital, Chicago—Death-rates in pneumonia and typhoid in large hospitals—Sir B. W. Richardson’s report of practice247

CHAPTER XI.
Reasons Why Alcohol is Dangerous as Medicine.

Researches of Abbott—Vital Resistance lowered by alcohol—Experiments upon Urinary Toxicity—Effect of alcohol upon the guardian-cells of the body—Dr. Sims Woodhead on immunity—Deléarde’s experiments at the Pasteur Institute—Dr. A. Pearce Gould on alcohol and cancer—Delirium in illness caused by alcohol262

CHAPTER XII.
Why Doctors Still Prescribe Alcoholics.

Public often demand it—Lack of knowledge of true nature of alcohol—Alcohol given undeserved credit for recoveries—Use of alcohol results from custom—Education of the people in teachings of non-alcoholic physicians necessary—Prescription of alcohol a matter of routine—Two examples291

CHAPTER XIII.
Alcoholic Proprietary or “Patent" Medicines.

The Pure Food Law—The guarantee—Newspaper opposition to the law—Headache remedies—Fake testimonials—Dangers of soothing syrups and morphine cough syrups—Fraud orders issued by Post-Office Department—Internal Revenue Department and Patent Medicines—Proprietary “Foods" strongly alcoholic—Alcoholic Cod-Liver Oil preparations—Australia’s Royal Commission on Patent Medicines—Committee on Pharmacy analyses—Malt extracts—Coca Wines—Advertising, the strength of the Nostrum business—An effectual remedy299

CHAPTER XIV.
Drugging.

Drugs do not cure disease—Nature cures—Opinions of drug medication of prominent physicians—La grippe caused by drug taking—Coal-tar drugs—Quinine—Sir Frederick Treves on disuse of drugs—People demand drugs of physicians—Mothers make drug victims of their children—Habit-producing drugs—Causes of drug-taking—How to be well335

CHAPTER XV.
Testimonies of Physicians Against Alcoholic Medication.

No need for substitutes for alcohol—Alcohol hides symptoms of disease—Responsibility of physicians—Opinions of many teachers in medical colleges—Hot milk better than alcohol—Journal of the American Medical Association on researches of Abbott and Laitinen—Resolution against alcohol of West Virginia Medical Society—Dr. Knox Bond on Scarlet Fever—Metchnikoff on white blood-cells—Kassowitz describes his treatment of fevers—Sims Woodhead’s opinions—Opinions of German Physicians—Dr. Harvey blames medical profession for careless use of alcohol and opium—Use of Alcohol declining rapidly in medical practice356

CHAPTER XVI.
Recent Researches Upon Alcohol.

Experiments of Laitinen—Resistance of blood-cells to disease lowered by alcohol—International Congress on Alcoholism, London, 1909—Alcohol and Immunity—Effect of Alcohol Drinking on Human Off-spring—Researches of Kraepelin and Aschaffenberg—Economic losses by reduced work through beer and wine drinking—Researches of Dr. Reid Hunt—Mice given alcohol killed by small doses of poison—Difference in effect of alcohol and starch foods—Chittenden on food theory of alcohol—Researches of Dr. S. P. Beebe—Liver impaired by alcohol—Dr. Winfield S. Hall’s interpretation of the researches of Beebe and Hunt—Oxidation of alcohol by liver a protective action—Researches show that alcohol is a poison, not a food392

CHAPTER XVII.
Miscellaneous.

Alcohol Baths—Beverages for the Sick—Tobacco and the Eyesight—Advertised “Cures" for Drunkenness—How to quit drinking—Dr. T. D. Crothers’ remedy for drink crave—Alcohol and Children—Alcohol Tested—Beer-Drinking Injurious to Health—Drug Drinks—Special Directions for Women—Total Abstinence and Life Insurance—Opinions of Life Insurance Companies on drinkers as risks410

INTRODUCTION.

This book is the outcome of many years of study. With the exception of a few quotations, none of the material has ever before appeared in any book. The writer has been indebted for years past to many of the physicians mentioned in the following pages for copies of pamphlets and magazines, and for newspaper articles, bearing upon the medical study of alcohol. Indeed, had it not been for the kindly counsels and hearty co-operation of physicians, she could never have accomplished all that was laid upon her to do as a state and national superintendent of Medical Temperance for the Woman’s Christian Temperance Union. She is also under obligation for helps received from the secretaries of several State Boards of Health, and from eminent chemists and pharmacists.

The object of the book is to put into the hands of the people a statement of the views regarding the medical properties of alcohol held by those physicians who make little, or no use of this drug. In most cases their views are given in their own language, so that the book is, of necessity, largely a compilation.

It is hoped that while the laity may be glad to peruse these pages because of the very useful and interesting information to be obtained from them, the medical profession, also, may be pleased to find, in brief form, the teachings of some of their most distinguished brethren upon a question now frequently up for discussion in society meetings.

The writer does not presume to set forth her own opinions upon a question which is still a subject of dispute among the members of a learned profession; she simply culls from the writings of those members of that profession who, having made thorough examination of the claims of alcohol, have decided that this drug, as ordinarily used, is more harmful than beneficial, and that medical practice would be upon a higher plane, were it driven entirely from the pharmacopœia.

PREFACE TO SECOND EDITION.

When the first edition of this book was published in 1900, there were only a few leading physicians either in Europe or America who were ready to condemn the medical use of alcohol. Sir Benjamin Ward Richardson, Sims Woodhead, and a few others in England; Forel, Kassowitz and one or two more on the Continent, and Nathan S. Davis, T. D. Crothers and J. H. Kellogg, in America, were about all that could be quoted largely as opposed to alcoholic liquors as remedies in disease. Whisky was then looked upon as necessary in the treatment of consumption and diphtheria. Ten years have brought about a great change. There are many American physicians now willing to admit that they have very little or no use for alcoholic liquors as remedial agents, and now, instead of recommending whisky for consumption anti-tuberculosis literature almost everywhere warns against the use of intoxicating drinks. The use of anti-toxin in diphtheria has driven out whisky treatment in that disease with markedly favorable results. Under the whisky treatment death-rates ran up to fifty-five and sixty per cent.; now the diphtheria death-rate is very low. Ten years ago many good authorities still ranked alcohol as a stimulant; now, almost all rank it as a depressant. In England, leading physicians and surgeons have spoken so strongly against alcohol in the last few years that the London Times, England’s leading newspaper, said: “According to recent developments of scientific opinion, it is not impossible that a belief in the strengthening and supporting qualities of alcohol will eventually become as obsolete as a belief in witchcraft.”

So far as the writer can learn from replies sent to her inquiries by teachers of medicine, and by study of text-books on medicine, and articles in good medical journals, alcohol now has only a very limited use in medicine with the great majority of successful physicians. Some recommend wine in diabetes mellitus, saying that it acts less like a poison and more like a food in that disease than in any other. Some use alcoholic liquors in fevers as a food “to save the burning of tissue,” but an article on “Therapeutics” in the Journal of the American Medical Association, for November 6, 1909, page 1564, says that sugar would probably have equal value in such case. The same article says that hot baths, with hot lemonade, and a quickly acting cathartic, will abort a cold without any need of recourse to alcohol.

The writer wishes here to make grateful acknowledgment of courtesies received from busy physicians who have aided materially in her work by answering personal letters of inquiry, also letters published in the Journal of the American Medical Association, by kindness of the editor. Especially would she thank those professors of medicine and superintendents of large hospitals, who so courteously aided her in preparing a paper for the International Congress on Alcoholism, held in London, July, 1909, to which she was a delegate, representing the United States government. A few of the replies received at that