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k
rMPORTANT
Federal repon
./""\.. sent to the U. S. Congress
last July 10 warns that a per–
son who drinks more than three
ounces of whiskey (the standard
"double"), a half bottle of wine, or
four glasses of beer daily runs
nearly a
2~
times greater risk of
mouth cancer than an abstainer, or
about the same cancer risk as a per–
son who smokes 40 cigarettes each
day. And if the heavy drinker added
these three ounces of whiskey to a
two-pack-a-day cigarette habit , the
risk of developing cancer of the
mouth or throat multiplied to 15
times that of an abstainer.
The repon considered three
ounces of whiskey (or about 1
'h
ounces of absolute alcohol) as the
"upper
limir
of moderation."
Bad News and Good News
So much for the bad news. The
other side of the reporl titled "Alco–
hol and Health" advised: "There is
no evidence that lhe moderate use
of alcohol is harmful
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health." In
fact. according to Dr. Morris E.
Chafetz, director of the National Jn–
st ilute of Alcohol Abuse and Alco–
holism, "Moderate drinkers, as a
statistical group, live longer than
abstainers or ex-drinkers."
Chafetz further stated, during a
White House seminar on alcohol–
ism, lhat moderate drinkers had a
lower rate of heart attacks and that
moderate drinking "may be physi–
cally. psychologically. and socially
beneficia! to active and institution–
alized older people."
When Alcohol ls Wrong
You are probably personally fa–
miliar with one or more people who
have not known how to drink mod–
eralely - who have instead been
ravaged by society's most popular
drug addiction, alcoholism. Many
great authors and artists are as well
known for their drinking habits as
their art. A large percentage have
died unlimely deaths due to alcohol.
They, like millions of their coun–
trymen. thirsted for the good life,
but ended up grabbing for more
PLAIN TRUTH October-November 1974
gusto than they could handle. They,
like most other alcoholics, remained
respectably employed until the end.
Their "Skid Row" was only between
their ears. These hidden alcoholics
(which comprise 95 to 97 percent of
all alcoholics) endured a life-long
battle between edgy abstinence and
horrible hangovers before collaps–
ing on their carpet ftoor with the
same finality as a Skid Row drunk
collapsing in the gutter.
Anyone looking at the twisted
lives of such alcoholics must con–
elude that alcohol, the substance of
and by itself, is surely an
e
vil thing.
It
is not alcohol, however, that is
wrong, but the wrong
use
of it. Alco–
hol is a chemical compound, com–
posed of a fixed and orderly set of
a toms which form a molecule of
ethyl alcohol (or
erhanol).
lnstead of recognizing the bene–
fits and dangers of this neutral
spirit, recent history is replete with
the controversy between the "alco–
hol-is-evil" temperance movement
(which advocates abstension rather
than temperance) and the "alcohol–
is- the-center-of-my-life" philosophy
of an alcohol-dependent rninority.
The "dry"·and "wet" controversy,
formerly waged wilhin state and na–
tional governmenl, is now being
fougbt on the county and local leve!
in sorne parts of the United Stales,
while the balance between dry and
wet is often ignored.
In schools, for instance, the evils
of overdrinking are quite graph–
ically portrayed - from dissecting
an alcohol-sotted liver in biology
classes, to the films of alcohol-in–
duced automobile wrecks in driver
education classes - but there is pre–
cious little (if any) education at
home or in school about the thera–
peutic value ofwine (as a medicinal,
antiseptic, social, ceremonial, nutri–
live or digestive-aiding beverage),
or the fact that nearly 90% of all
drinkers seldom if ever drink to ex–
cess.
Alcohol's Dual Nature
Alcohol is a sedative, but
in
small
amounts it acts Like a stimulant.
This is because the areas of re–
straint, judgment, and inhibition are
the first regions of the brain to be
affected. Therefore, while the
tongue and body a re loosed to say
and do things that the brain would
otherwise prohibit, the brain 's
memory, motor functions, and Iogi–
cal function are not immediately
impaired. In smaU quantities, this
"social lubrication" can be thera–
peutic, but in many cases, drinkers
don't stop imbibing when stimu–
lated.
Larger amounts of alcohol serve
as a depressant to the more objec–
tive centers of the brain (memory,
motor, and logical functions).
Shakespeare expressed this duality
by saying alcohol "provokes the de–
si r e but takes away the perfor–
mance."
A more scientific explanation of
Shakespeare's couplet was revealed
recently in a thorough study of
young college men. Various groups
were given one, two, or three ounces
of absolute alcohol (in cocktail
form), then they were tested on their
ability to solve problems of sym–
bolic logic.
Those who consumed one ounce
of alcohol (equivalent to about two
normal cocktails) actually per–
formed
be11er
as a unit than when
they abstained from all alcohol.
Those who consumed two ounces
performed about equally as well as
when they abstained, while those
who consumed three ounces of alco–
hol (about six drinks) performed de–
cidedly worse than when they
abstained.
France and ltaly
The French consume by far the
largest amount of alcohol per per–
son per year: 22.6 litres (or 6 gal–
lons) of absolute alcohol. The
average French adult drinks 125
litres of wine, 1O litres of distilled
spi rits, and 50 lo 75 litres of beer per
year. This is a 50 percent larger
amount of absolute alcohol lhan
that consumed by the second rank–
ing nation, Italy.
Many Frenchmen drink wine in
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