422 HEALTH AND DISEASE 



Sleep is one way in which all cells in the body and particularly 

 those of the nervous system get their rest. The nervous system, 

 by far the most delicate and hardest worked set of tissues in the 

 body, needs rest more than do other tissues, for its work directing 

 the body only ends with sleep or unconsciousness. The afternoon 

 nap, snatched by the brain worker, gives him renewed energy for 

 his evening's work. It is not hard application to a task that 

 wearies the brain ; it is continuous work without rest. 



Effect of Alcohol on the Ability to Resist Disease. Among 

 certain classes of people the belief exists that alcohol in the form of 

 brandy or some other drink or in patent medicines, malt tonics, 

 and the like is of great importance in building up the body so as 

 to resist disease or to cure it after disease has attacked it. Nothing 

 is further from the truth. In experiments on over three hundred 

 animals, including dogs, rabbits, guinea pigs, fowls, and pigeons, 

 Laitenen of the University of Helsingsfors and Professor Frankel 

 of Halle found that alcohol without exception made these animals 

 more susceptible to disease than were the controls. 



Use of Alcohol in the Treatment of Disease. In the Lon- 

 don Temperance Hospital alcohol was prescribed seventy-five 

 times in thirty-three years. The death rate in this hospital has 

 been lower than that of most general hospitals. Sir William 

 Collins, after serving nineteen years as surgeon in this hospital, 

 said : 



" In my experience, speaking as a surgeon, the use of alcohol is not 

 essential for successful surgery. ... At the London Temperance Hos- 

 pital, where alcohol is very rarely prescribed, the mortality in amputation 

 cases and in operation cases generally is remarkably low. Total abstainers 

 are better subjects for operation, and recover more rapidly from accidents, 

 than those who habitually take stimulants." 



Dr. MacNicholl says : " During a period of ten years the Chicago 

 hospitals in which alcohol was employed in pneumonia showed a death 

 rate of twenty-eight to thirty-eight per cent. Non-alcoholic medication 

 during the same period at the Mercy Hospital showed a death rate in 

 pneumonia of less than twelve per cent. . . . The mortality in our hos- 

 pitals bears a very close relation to the per capita of alcohol prescribed. In 

 the Fordham Hospital, where seventy-two cents per capita of alcohol is 

 prescribed, one out of every eight patients who enter for treatment dies. 

 In the German Hospital, Philadelphia, where forty-three cents per capita 

 of alcohol is prescribed, one of every sixteen patients die. In the Red 



