The Waterbury Democrat., 1941-09-19

New Haven, Conn, Sept. 10--A severe indictment of the treatment of alcoholics in American jails and correctional institutions Is made by Austin H. MacCormick, executive director of the Osborne Association of New York city, in the current is- sue of the Quarterly Journal Of Studies on Alcohol, published today at its editorial office in the Yale Laboratory of Applied Physiology.
 "Only when alcoholism is treated as a problem of public health and mental hygiene, rather than of law and penology, and the alcoholic con. sidered sick person in need of treatment rather than an offender in need of punishment, will we put an end to our present record Of al- most complete failure" he says.
 Six Faults Listed
 Listing six faults in present ct. tempts to salvage alcoholics, MT. MacCormick states:
 "i. That a veritable army of hu. man beings charged with intoxica. ton passes through our police sta- tions, courts and jails every year.
 "2. That many of them are al- coholics whom nothing but the most scientific and prolonged treatment can cure.
 B. That they and the common drunks in whose ranks they march benefit little from the penal and correctional treatment they receive and are, in most instances, harmed by 1t.
 4. That most of those sent to institutions go to ordinary county jails for very short sentences, often as low as five days and sometimes only two, and that they return time and again.
 "5. That our jails are notorious ly bad; that medical services In them are generally inadequate to care for phys ical ailments and that psychotherapy of any sort is vir- tually unheard of.
 "6. That a few state farms and larger city institutions have made an attempt to treat alcoholism in Q scientific way but are defeated by the lack of psychiatric personnel and the shortness of sentences"
 MT. MacCormick charges that re- gardless of the lack of extensive and exact statistical, social, medical and scientific data, all intelligent persons, who have had any con- siderable experience with our pres- ent methods of dealing with the true alcoholic and the common drunk from the penal and correc- tional standpoint, recognize that those methods are unscientific and socially unsound, and that they are wasteful of public funds and of hu- man beings alike.
 Physical Harm
 Certainly the physical harm, and still more the psychic damage caused by the jail sentence which often follows arrest and conviction is not conducive to the cure of al- coholism," he says.
 Present ineffective methods have arisen because of a ''lack of under standing in the public mind and in the minds of a very large pro- portion of our police, prosecutors judges, penal and correctional off cials and legislators. of the signifi- l canoe of alcoholism or of the com plexity of the problem presented by the various types of heavy drink CTS who fall into the tolls of thu law"
 Factors overlooked are the pro longed therapy necessary to effec a cure, the necessity of favorable conditions for treatment and fol low-up care and other medical ant social problems.
 The public and many penal art correctional officials do not thinl of alcoholic victims as human be- ings in need of treatment but rath' CT as offenders who are to be pun ished.
 Methods of conducting court hear ings are attacked by Mr. MacCor' mick, who says that previous osfen' ses and not medical data goverE the sentences imposed. Through out the hearing" he comments, "thl defendant may have been in suct condition that medical attention was imperative from the physlca standpoint and had long beei from the mental standpoint. havI known Of men who were dyane ol their feet while they were neinl lectured by a judge and who dlei within an hour after being as