Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1895-05-14
IMPURE AIR AND INEBRIETY,
Some Rather Remarkable Cases Cited
by Physician.

by n Physician.
Or. T. D. Crothers, in Popular Health Magazine.
Bad air and bad ventilation always leave
the system deblitated and favor auto-in-
toxications, and the formation of COM
pounds in the blood and tissues that are
distinctly poisonous Alcohol used at this
time may bring to the system germs and
soil for the culture and growth of still
more poisonous states. In all events 1t
brings increased weakness and degenera-
ton with diminished power of resistance.
Inebriates from crowded tenements and
basement residences are always more de-
generate. Inebriates from homes of wealth,
in wealthy sections of cities, where pos
sible bad ventilation exists, are equally ex-
hausted and worn out. Both of these
classes make rapid recoveries in well-venti-
lated rooms and seem to have been suffer-
ing largely from poisoned air.
Clerks, business men, and persons who
have ill-ventilated offices, where they spend
many hours each day, are far more inclin-
ed to use spirits than others in better sur
roundings.
A case was reported to me by an eminent
New York physician, Of a merchant who
tried to abstain from all use of spirits at
home. without success. He worked steadi-
ly in his office and lived in a rich house up
town, where, apparently, every condition
Of healthy living was present. After sew
eral Intellectual efforts to give up all use
of spirits, he went out camping in the
White mountain region. In a few days all
taste for spirits left him, and for the first
time in twenty years he became total alb
stainer.
On leturn to the city he drank again and
could not stop. The next season he moved
out In the country, and all taste for spirits
left him. Finally, he gave up his city resi-
dence and lives out in the country, coming
to the city for a few hours at a time and
has become a total abstainer. not having
any taste or desire for spirits. 1t seems
most rational to suppose that poisoned air
and defective ventilation We're the exciting
causes of the drink craze in this case No
other condition of surroundings and living
could explain his ability to stop drinking
in the country and not in the CITY,
Another incident well verified, seemed to
bring out the same fact: A delicate rery-
Gus child of SIX years, supposed to be in
clined to consumption, was guarded with
extraordinary care against colds and the
open air. in a rich city home. At fifteen
years of age strong taste for spirits de-
veloped and at twenty he was an inebriate.
His mother died and he was forced to go
into the country to live. He became a
total abstainer at once and is now, at
twenty-s1X years,a strong temperance man.
1t would appear that in this case some
condition of cell and tissue starvation be-
gan from defective aeration and continued
until the surroundings changed.
l think the poison from defective oXida-
ton of the blood, together with imperfect
elimination Of waste products, is very
active factor in inebriety. In all rational
treatment efforts to remove these possible
causes should precede all other means of
treatment. The continual inhalation of
impure and defective air is always followed
by the accumulation of poisons which,
in many ways unknown, cause reflex
nerve disturbances and reactions. The
heart contracts more frequently, respra-
ton is accelerated and elaboration of nu-
tritive material is altered in all the cells
CT the body. Fatigue, depression and low
cred vitality follow. Alcohol at tins time
is grateful narcotic, which not only con-
ceals the real condition, put brings increas-
ed degeneration with new bacteria forma-
tions and diminished resistance to disease.
The brain and nervous system suffers as
much as any other part of the body, al
though this is not recognized.