Alcohol: A Dangerous and Unnecessary Medicine, How and Why

“It is by its sedative action that alcohol has obtained its position in public opinion. It will render persons insensible to various uneasy sensations, and the majority prefer to continue the bad habits which produce the uneasy sensations, and then to take them away by a dose or two of some alcoholic liquor, or, indeed, to take this before the uneasy sensations come on. In this way they do themselves injury and make themselves unconscious of it. Dr. Beaumont, who had the opportunity of examining the interior of Alexis St. Martin’s stomach, and of seeing how digestion went on, was astonished to see how inflamed the mucous membrane could be without any consciousness of it. He observed, as a matter of fact, that alcoholic drinks of all kinds hindered the process of digestion, and produced this morbid condition of the mucous membrane. The relief, therefore, which can be obtained by alcohol is delusive and dangerous.

“But some persons say they are afraid to abandon the use of alcohol because they have been in the habit of taking it for a long period. This fear is entirely groundless. The alcohol will be missed for a time, just as a person who has been using crutches would miss them if thrown away; but they will do better without both after a little while. There is no kind of constitution which renders a person unable to do without alcohol. The prisoners in all our jails have to leave off their drink at once, and altogether, on entering there, and no harm ever ensues in consequence. But some say that this is because their diet is so carefully arranged, and the hygienic condition of the prison so perfect. Quite so. This shows us clearly that when total abstainers become ill outside the prison, their illness is to be attributed to some error in diet or hygiene, or to some accidental circumstance. It is absurd to think that the infraction of one law of health can be nullified by breaking another; that if you eat too much, or too fast, or too often, or what is not good for you, you can escape the consequences by injuring yourself with alcohol.”

Dr. N. S. Davis was for many years openly sneered at by many of his professional brethren as “a cold-water fanatic.” Since his views are now being rapidly adopted by progressive medical men all over the civilized world, it may be that soon those physicians who cling to alcohol will deserve the soubriquet of “alcohol fanatics.” Dr. Davis said: —

“If I am asked why the profession continues to prescribe these drinks, I answer; simply from the force of habit and traditional education, coupled with a reluctance to risk the experiment of omitting them while the general popular notions sanction their use. Nothing is easier than self-deception in this matter. A patient is suddenly taken with syncope, or nervous weakness, from which abundant experience has shown that a speedy recovery would take place by simple rest and fresh air. But in the alarm of friends something must be done. A little wine or brandy is given, and as it is not sufficient to positively prevent, the patient in due time revives just as would have been the case if neither wine nor brandy had been used.

“Of course both doctor and friends will regard the so-called stimulant as the cause of the recovery. So, too, when patients are getting weak, in the advanced stage of fever, or some other self-limited disease, an abundance of nourishment is regularly administered, in the greater part of which is mixed some kind of alcoholic drink. The latter will always occupy the chief attention, and if, after a severe run, the fever, or disease, finally disappears, it will be said that the patient was sustained or ‘kept alive’ for over two or three weeks, as the case may be, ‘solely by the stimulants,’ when, in fact, if the same nourishment and care had been given without a drop of alcohol, he would have convalesced sooner, and more perfectly, as I have seen demonstrated a thousand times in my experience.”

Dr. Casgrau, of Dublin, says that physicians who make personal use of alcohol are not able to give an unbiased opinion about its action, as one of its most marked effects is that of a narcotic to the mental powers; such physicians are not so acute to observe the action of this, or any drug.

Sir B. W. Richardson, M. D., in an address upon the reasons why physicians still prescribe alcoholics, says that the magnetism of public opinion has great weight with professional men.

“All professions are under that subtle influence. All professions whatever their duties, whatever their learning may be, are sensitive and obedient to that influence. In their pride they think they lead public opinion; it is a mistake, they always follow it on every question in which the people, at large, have a voice. They can assist in influencing the public voice, and sometimes, to quote the words of Abbé Purcelle, spoken in the dawn of the great French Revolution, they may prove that ‘respect for sovereign power sometimes consists in transgressing its orders,’ but as a general rule not merely the orders but the inclinations are obeyed. We have to wait on, and for, public opinion, and in nothing so much as on the subject of alcohol. The use of alcoholic beverages rests not on argument but on habit, custom. To those whom it affects personally it is an absolute monarch. It makes its own empire. By the very action which it has upon the body of those who receive it into themselves it rules and governs. The joke of the inebriate man that when he had taken his potation he was quite another man and that then he felt it his duty to treat that other man, is literally true, a terse and faithful expression of a natural fact. The man or woman born and bred under the influence of alcohol is of the race of alcohol, and as distinct a person as any racial peculiarity can supply. The reason, the judgment, the temper, the senses are attuned by it. It is loved by its lovers like life. The grape to them is no longer a luscious fruit; it is ‘the mother of mighty wine,’ and he who is bold enough to disown that motherhood must stand apart. How can a profession however strong, march all at once against such an overwhelming influence? Itself born, perchance, under the influence bred under it, how shall it immediately be transformed? Why disobey the influence? It is in the interest of the doctor to obey, in a worldly sense of view; but more – it is in his nature to obey. The strong bands of nature and interest go hand in hand. Is it wonderful that the genius of a professional man so situated should, according to the quality of his genius, uphold, root and branch, the rôle of his nativity? On the contrary the wonder is that he has ever done anything else. It is most natural that he should be amongst the last to take up what revolutionizes all the manners, and customs, and faiths, of society. A lady will ask her physician the question, May I take wine, Sir? As much as you like Madam; it is very bad for you and I take none, but that is your business entirely. Henceforth that gentleman is said to be one who prescribes alcohol in any quantity. In fact, he never prescribes it, for although when forbidding is hopeless, there is all the difference in the world between prescribing and permitting, permitting goes down as if it were prescribing. Often a patient will try to compromise. On an ocean of whisky and water, brandy and soda, or other poisonous mixture, he is floating into fatal paralysis. You tell him so faithfully, and he says he knows it and will drop down to claret. If you assent, he tells his friends you have changed his brandy or whisky to wine; if you dissent, he says you have left your duty as a doctor undone, in order to become an advocate for abstaining temperance, about which he is as competent a judge as you are, and he won’t pay fees for that advice. He pays to be cured of his disease, not to be dragooned into a system peculiar in its tenets. In an alcoholic world there is a strong argument in this decision. It rolls splendidly, especially down hill.”

After speaking of non-alcoholic physicians, and their opinions of the harmfulness of alcohol, he adds: —

“On the other side, there are practitioners who, under the magnetism of public opinion, as earnestly believe the opposite in relation to alcohol, who declare they could not, conscientiously, practice their profession if they were debarred the use of alcohol, and who look on the advance and the growth of scientific abstaining principles – which they cannot avoid recognizing – with positive dread. The extremists on this side are indeed extreme in their fanaticism. They shut their eyes to the most obvious facts, and do not hesitate in their blindness to misrepresent the most obvious truths. They affirm that under the influence of total abstinence and, by inference, because of total abstinence, the yearly decreasing death-rate of the population is accompanied by reduction of vitality; that people who live long are more enfeebled than those who live short lives and merry; that under abstinence from alcohol fearful diseases are being developed; that the total abstainers have less power for resisting disease than the moderate temperate; and that under the current system of advance towards total abstinence, a very small advance yet by the way, diseases of a low type have developed and extended their ravages.”

It is only physicians of large conscientiousness, or of great independence of character, who will dare to go counter to the prejudices of the people.

Consequently, it is necessary to educate the people in the teachings of those physicians, whose eminence in the profession has permitted them, or whose conscientiousness has driven them, to expose the delusions concerning the medical value of alcoholic beverages. When the people cease to believe in alcoholic remedies, physicians will no longer prescribe them. But while the majority desire the “physicians’ prescription” as a cover for indulgence, there will be found physicians willing to give such prescriptions.

That the prescription of alcohol by physicians is largely a matter of routine may be seen from the following two cases, reported to the writer by county superintendents of the department of Medical Temperance.

In the first case, the physician said to the nurse, “If the patient’s heart becomes weak, you might give a little brandy or whisky.” Seeing reluctance expressed upon the nurse’s countenance, he added hastily, “Or coffee, strong coffee will do just as well.” The nurse in reporting this to the writer, said, “Why couldn’t he have ordered coffee in the first place if he thought it equally good?”

The second case was that of an aged woman whose physician ordered whisky as a tonic. Her granddaughter ventured to ask, “Would not whisky have a narcotic rather than a tonic effect?” He replied thoughtfully, “Well, tell the truth, I suppose it would.”

CHAPTER XIII.

ALCOHOLIC PROPRIETARY OR ‘PATENT’ MEDICINES

America has been called the Paradise of Quacks, and with good reason. For years patent medicine manufacturers had such complete control of the American press, both secular and religious, that it was almost impossible to reach the public with information as to the real nature of these concoctions. Consequently the people accepted with amazing credulity the startling claims to miraculous cures of various pills and potions as set forth under glaring headlines in the daily papers. The publicity of the last few years has hurt the traffic seriously, but it still has a great hold upon the ignorant and credulous part of the population, and there is still a very large number of these preparations upon the market. Many persons think that the Pure Food Law guarantees every drug preparation now sold to be perfectly safe for use. This is a great error. The guarantee means simply that the manufacturer guarantees that his preparation is as he states upon the label; the government guarantees nothing concerning the matter. That the guarantee of the manufacturer is not always truthful has been shown by analyses of some preparations made by state and national chemists. All the advantage that the public has through the Pure Food Law, so far as drug preparations are concerned, is that the percentage of alcohol must be printed upon the label, and the presence of certain dangerous drugs, such as morphine, cocaine, and acetanilid must be indicated. Thus persons intelligent as to the nature of these drugs will avoid medicines which the label says contains them. The ignorant are not protected. It was difficult to secure even this small restriction upon the sale of proprietary medicines because of the opposition of a large number of newspaper publishers who were sharing the ill-gotten gains of the medical fakirs.

A careful compilation of manufacturers’ announcements list 1,806 so-called patent medicines sold in open markets, in which alcohol, opium or other toxic drugs form constituent parts. 675 of the preparations are known as “bitters,” stomachics, or cordials, and alcohol enters into their composition in quantities varying from fifteen to fifty per cent.; 390 are recommended for coughs and colds, nearly all of which contain opium. Sixty remedies are sold for the relief of pain, and no other purpose. 120 are for nervous troubles, and of this number, sixty-five have entering into their composition coca leaves, or kola nut, or both, or are represented by their respective active principles, cocaine or caffeine. 129 are offered for headaches, and kindred ailments, and usually with a guarantee to give immediate relief. In these are generally compounded phenacetine, caffeine, antipyrine, acetanilid, or morphine, diluted with soda, or sugar of milk. Dysentery, diarrhœa, cholera morbus, cramp in bowels, etc., have 185 quick reliefs or “cures” to their credit, nearly all of which contain opium, many of them in addition, alcohol, ginger, capsicum or myrrh in various combinations, and there are numerous cases on record where children and adults have been narcotized by their excessive use. Some manufacturers print on the labels covering these goods, words of caution limiting the amount to be taken. Forty-eight compounds for asthma contain caffeine and morphine. Sufferers from toothache have their choice from thirty-eight remedies, and thirty-six soothing, or teething, syrups are provided for infants.

Many people have ignorantly and innocently formed an alcohol, morphine, or cocaine habit through the use of patent medicines. Many deaths have occurred from headache powders of which acetanilid is the chief ingredient. Dr. Harvey W. Wiley, chief of the Bureau of Chemistry, says of these headache powders: —

“A woman has a headache and she uses one of these remedies. It relieves the pain. When she has another attack she uses it again and again with the same result. After a while she finds the usual amount of the remedy does not cure the pain. She uses two portions, and so the habit is formed until absolute danger is confronted. For one thing must not be forgotten: these remedies are powerful, for if they were not they would be of no effect. They are in certain doses deadly; they depress the nervous system; they disturb the digestion; they interfere with natural sleep; they require to be used in increasingly larger quantities as the system becomes accustomed to their use; they are almost without exception excreted by the kidneys, thus adding an additional burden to organs already badly overworked. They produce a habit of gaining relief which becomes an obsession and incapable of being resisted.”

It may be asked, “How is it if these mixtures are harmful only, that so many people profess to have received benefit from them?” There are different reasons for this.

1. The nature of such drugs as alcohol, opium and cocaine is to benumb sensation, so that pain is stilled, and the pain, or functional disturbance forgotten for the time, because the nerves are drugged into insensibility. The person feels better while under the influence of the drug, so thinks it is benefiting him.

2. There are people who imagine they have diseases which they do not have; since trained physicians occasionally err in diagnosis, it is not strange if the laity should do likewise. Such persons are always ready to aver that a certain medicine “cured” them.

A ludicrous example of this is a woman out West, whose picture graces the advertisements of a certain nostrum, accompanied by a testimonial that said nostrum cured her of a “polypus”! Upon being written to as to how such a preparation could effect such a cure, she answered that, after giving the testimonial, she found that she had not had a polypus!

3. Some of the cures attributed to drugs, are doubtless due to Nature. It is estimated that from 30 to 90 per cent. of ailments are cured by Nature, unassisted, and often in spite of, the drugs swallowed. Many of the books advertising these remedies (?) give excellent rules of health, which, if followed, would restore persons to vigor more speedily without the accompanying medicine, than they can be restored while the system has the poisonous drugs to throw off. It may be reasonably assumed that a goodly number of recoveries ascribed to drug treatments are due, in reality, to the resisting force of a good constitution, or to obedience to the laws of health given in the circular.

4. It is not uncommon for people suffering from certain diseases to have temporary remissions in the course of the disease. No doubt, some of the cases reported as cures are such spontaneous remissions, which are followed, after the testimonials have been written, by relapse. The majority of people are ignorant of the natural course of diseases – of what happens when no treatment is taken. They do not know that a great many affections are characterized by periods of apparent recovery. For instance in some varieties of paralysis, as well as in consumption, the sufferer may to appearance recover completely for a few months or longer; if a remedy was being used at the time, it would naturally get the credit of causing the favorable change.

However, all of the glowing testimonials of wonderful benefits accruing from patent medicines are not what they seem to be. Dr. J. H. Kellogg says in his Monitor of Health: —

“The average manufacturer of patent medicines regularly employs a person of some literary attainment whose duty it is to invent vigorous testimonials of sufferings relieved by Dr. Charlatan’s universal panacea. In many instances persons are hired to give testimonials, and answer letters of inquiry in such a way as to encourage business. The shameless dishonesty and ingenious villainy exhibited are beyond description.”

Recently an advertisement of one of these nostrums stated in the headlines that said nostrum was used in the Frances Willard Temperance Hospital, Chicago. The testimonial appended purported to be from a nurse in that hospital, but the testimonial did not state, as did the headlines, that the preparation was ever used in that hospital. The president of the hospital board of trustees states that the nurse positively denies having given any testimonial to the company thus advertising. She did give one to another patent medicine concern, but not to this, and never said either was used in the hospital, nor have they been. Suit could be brought for damages, but unfortunately the patent medicine people have unlimited money, and the hospital has not.

Early in the present year there appeared in many daily papers a large advertising picture of a man whose name was appended as a professional nurse of a western city.

The following testimonial accompanied the picture: —

“Mr. – of – , who is a professional nurse of experience, writes, – ‘My friend is improving, thanks to – , and you. I am called on to nurse the sick of all classes. I recommend – to such an extent that I am nicknamed – (giving name of nostrum) by nearly everybody.’”

As the writer of this book was acquainted with a physician residing in the small city mentioned in the advertisement, she wrote to him, requesting that he investigate this testimonial.

He replied that he found the chief part of the advertisement, namely, that Mr. – was a professional nurse, false; “First, by his own statement as he told me this morning that he never claimed to be a professional nurse. And my personal acquaintance with him, as well as that of a number of other physicians in our little city, and reliable men and women of this community who are acquainted with him, all testify to the same thing, namely; that he is not a professional nurse, neither is he a nurse, or even a reliable man. He is an innocent, ignorant man, very close to the pauper class. He told me when I read the commendation to which his name is affixed, that it was all true except the professional nurse part, and that was entirely false, as stated above.”

As the picture was of a fine-looking, intelligent-appearing man it probably was as genuine as the testimonial.

The following was clipped from a copy of Merck’s Report, April, 1899, a druggists’ paper published in New York city: —

Many Druggists IndignantA PATENT-MEDICINE ADVERTISEMENT CONTAINS UNAUTHORIZED ENDORSEMENTS

“Fully a score of East-side druggists are up in arms over the unauthorized use of their names in a full-page newspaper advertisement of a widely-known specific. This advertisement appeared recently in certain New York daily papers, and retail druggists who have made it a rule of their business never to recommend any particular proprietary article, found themselves quoted in unqualified laudation of the article so liberally advertised. The names and addresses of the druggists were given in full, and when several of the men quoted conferred together they found that the most barefaced misrepresentation had been resorted to.

“One of the pharmacists thus misrepresented, happened to be Sidney Faber, the secretary of the Board of Pharmacy. He was not selling this particular specific, and had never said a word for or against it, nevertheless, six or eight lines of endorsement of the article were directly attributed to him. He called on some of his druggist neighbors whose names he saw in the advertisement, and ascertained that they, too, had been falsely and unwarrantably quoted. Mr. Faber promptly wrote to the proprietors of the specific in question, and denounced the published endorsements bearing his name, as a forgery. His indignation was by no means appeased when he received a letter from the proprietary concern, couched in the following language: ‘We regret to learn that you have been annoyed by any statements that have appeared in New York city papers. We will forward your letter to them.’

“Within the past few days several of the druggists whose names were used in this advertisement without authority, have been considering the advisability of taking legal proceedings in order to ascertain their rights in the matter. It is contrary to pharmaceutical ethics for a pharmacist to specially endorse any proprietary article, or patent medicine. Some of the offended druggists propose to contribute to a fund for the purpose of publicly, and widely, advertising this unwarranted use of their names.”

When patent medicine advertisers would dare to resort to such a wholesale fraud as this, what may they be expected to refrain from?

As an illustration of how commendations from notable persons are sometimes obtained, the following is cited: In the winter of 1899, appeared an advertising picture of the lovely Christian lady from Denmark, the Countess Schimmelmann, who was spending some time in Chicago. Below her picture were the words: —

“Adeline, Countess Schimmelmann, whose portrait is here given, in a recent letter to the – company, (mentioning proprietors of nostrum) speaks of friends of hers who have been benefited by – (mentioning nostrum), and who first advised her to recommend it to her sick friends.

“The Countess, as is well known, is a prominent member of the Danish court. Her coming to this country has been much talked of. Her real object is one of charity. She is stopping in Chicago, and from there writes her straightforward endorsement of – (mentioning nostrum).”

The italics are the writer’s. The picture and the testimonial were cut from the paper, and sent to the countess, asking if she had so spoken of this medicine, and, if so, did she, a strong total abstinence woman, know that this mixture contains a large percentage of alcohol.

She responded as follows: —

“Thank you for asking me about the enclosed. A white-ribbon lady came and asked me if I would do her the great kindness to recommend – compound (made up of the juice of celery). I said I could not personally recommend it as I neither use, nor want, medicine. But some very reliable friends of mine (temperance people, and true Christians) told me I would do a good thing in recommending it as they used it, and found it excellent. Then I wrote the following: ‘I myself cannot recommend – compound as I do not suffer from any of the ailments it is said to be good for, but reliable friends of mine tell me that it is excellent, and I would do a good thing in recommending it to my friends. Adeline, Countess Schimmelmann.’