The Bridgeport evening farmer., 1910-02-26
and Medical Director, Manhattan State Hospital, New
 York City
By WILLIAM MABON, NJ. D.

Manhattan State Hospital, New York City
 i (Exclusive Service The Survey Pres Bureau.)
 have been impressed with the fac
 that the abuse of alcohol is one of the
 most prominent causes of insanity ant this view is now quite generally ac- cepted by alienists the world over. Tn study which was made last veal of 961 cases of insanity admitted tc the Manhattan State Hospital 1T which a fairly reliable history coult he obtained. we found that of all the
 causes. alcohol, either alone or com bined. stood out most prominently. O1 35S men whose insanity was said to be due to physical causes, 145. or ovel forty per cent, were due to alcoho alone, while 231. or over sixty-four pei cent, were due to alcohol and other physical causes.
 Among the 336 women in whom the
 exciting cause was physical, twenty five per cent. were due to alcoho
 alone and thirty-three per cent. were
 due to alcohol and other physical
 agents.
 Considering the causes of insanity in all the 961 cases. alcohol alone or combined with other physical agents
 WctS II'0 pICCIplUdliIlS IdCIOF III IHlTly-
 seven per cent. Among the men il was fifty-five per cent, and among the
 women twenty-two per cent.
 J. K. OCOnnor. judge of the city
 court of Utica writes me that in his opinion the use of alcohol is directly Or indirectly responsible for the pres ence of seven-tenths of his daily visit ors.
 B. Roger Wales. city judge of Bing- hamton. states that he could give the names of one hundred persons in that city needing treatment for iIebriety and that if these one hundred persons could be kept permanently sober niS
 demeanors involving moral turpitude would decrease thirty-three and one third per cent. in that community.
 Wilfred H. Sherill. judge of the city court of Poughkeepsie, believes that the abuse of alcohol is present in eighty-five per cent of the cases com ing before him on the criminal side of the city court. and at least forty per cent. of the cases occur solely from intoxication.
 If this is the experience of the city magistrates in three of the municipal courts, it is fair to assume that the same conditions exist throughout the entire commonwealth, and taken in connection with our experience at the Manhattan State Hospital with alcohol dS d1 6ClOlO0ICdI IdcCOT III lHSd1lCy, tie situation demands some provision on the part of the community for the care and treatment of those who are vic- tims of this toxic agent. All physic- ians are at their wits end to find even a temporary abode for those suffering from the immediate effects of alco- hol.
 The question naturally arises wheth- CT provision should be made by the State or the individual communities. Now the former has undertaken cer- tain work which needs still further provision. such as the care of the in- sane, and other dependents like the feeble-minded. the epileptic. the blind, the deaf and dumb. and juvenile delin- auents. and the revenue of the State has rot been great enough to give ap- propriations sufficient for these needs. Indeed, the accommodations for the insane are sadly deficient and new buildings cannot be erected fast enough for the constantly increasing numbers who need treatment. Among the insane alone. for the past two years there has been an annual in crease of over a thousand in the State hospitals. and the hospitals in the metropolitan district are crowded from twenty-five to thirty-five per cent. in individual instances. It will readily be seen that with such a con- dition, the first duty of the State is to