How Does Alcohol Affect Your Health? Part 1

What about alcohol? How does it affect your health?Alcohol is both a blessing and a curse, a poison and a food, a 'pick-me-up' and a 'lay-me-down', both an appetite stimulator and a destroyer; it is truly a mass of contradictions. The very name whiskey originates from the ancient Gaelic word "usquebrugh" - water of life! Over 65 per cent of the United States population (more than 100 million Americans) drink alcoholic beverages. Of these, 76 per cent are men and 24 per cent are women. The occasional drinkers total 48 per cent; 27 per cent of men and 8 per cent of women are regular drinkers - that is, people who drink moderately or heavily at least three times a week. There are over 3 million heavy, constant drinkers, and over 750,000 alcoholics or addicts of "hard liquor". Billions of dollars are spent each year on alcohol in the U.S.A. alone, more than is spent by Americans for their own health and medical care. All figures show the growing increase in the drinking habit as part of life and social custom in our country. Let us then take a scientific look at the 'uses and abuses' of alcohol, particularly where our health is concerned.

The influence of alcohol on the mind. The poet says, "What wonders does not wine! It discloses secrets, ratifies and confirms our hopes, thrusts the coward forth to battle, eases the anxious mind of its burden, instructs in arts. Whom has not a cheerful glass made eloquent. Whom not quite free and easy from pinching poverty."

Alcohol not a stimulant but a depressant. The most important chemical effect of alcohol is on the brain and the nervous system. Although it is called by the public a "stimulant," it is actually a depressant that tends to lower inhibitions and results in impulsive behavior. Alcoholic beverages have been advised in moderate amounts for many years by physicians to relax nervous or high-strung patients, to calm their anxieties, and generally to sedate them. Very often just the psychological idea of a glass of wine, beer, or whisky is enough to suggest or induce relaxation in many people, particularly at a social function. Alcohol is often used as an out-and-out sedative, narcotic, or analgesic to relieve pain or distress or fatigue. But in order to avoid toxic effects, the amount must be kept small to moderate. The temporary release from the nervous and physical strains of daily living, which most people get by taking one or two drinks before dinner, is well-known to all. And as for that relaxant drink before bedtime - I prescribe it for many of my patients upon whom it acts as a helpful sedative.

It can be useful as a "tonic," Alcohol is used extensively in compounding prescriptions, particularly as a tincture. Not only is it an excellent solvent and preserving agent, but it stimulates the appetite through increasing the gastric juices, it relaxes the stomach muscles, and enables greater quantities of food and drink to be taken. In older patients, the prescriptions containing alcohol serve additionally as dilators of the blood vessels and seem to be helpful to the circulation. Alcohol in small or moderate amounts is a mild stimulant to the kidneys, causing an increase in the output of urine. Alcohol also tends to increase the heart rate and the metabolic rate. As is universally known, alcohol is an excellent antiseptic, and exerts a cooling effect on the skin.

Alcohol as a food. The caloric counts of the various alcoholic beverages are described in the chapter on calories and are self-explanatory. One can readily gain weight by indulging in those extra drinks daily. But these are "empty calories" being burned up or oxidized in the form of heat and are not developed into useful, healthy bodily tissue. Alcohol is sometimes given intravenously, especially following surgical operations, to supply a concentrated form of calories and energy.