In A Pickle
‘ONE way to escape the ravages of bird flu is to pickle ourselves in alcohol.
But take care overdoing the pickling process can lead to cirrhosis of the liver and all manner of alcohol-related illnesses.
Not that youre listing, being too drunk to pay attention. But the Mail talks on. It says that we Britons are drinking ourselves to death at the fastest rate in Europe.
The paper says that over the past 40 years, alcohol consumption in the UK has doubled. Drinking to excess now kills 22,000 of us a year.
This is sobering stuff. And Professor Robin Room, writing in the medial journal The Lancet, blames the Government for not making the reduction of the populations alcohol intake a policy goal.
But how can legislation curtail our love of booze? Professor Ian Gilmore, head of the Royal College of Physicians alcohol committee, thinks he knows. He calls for a clampdown on alcohol advertising, leading to a total ban.
Its not a bad idea. Let booze follow the example set by cigarettes. But while even one fag is bad for us, we often hear medics extolling the virtues of a glass of wine or vitamin-rich beer.
A ban does not seem the best way to go. Better, perhaps, to create a culture that doesnt value getting off your face on hooch so highly.
Or just replace booze with something else and get the medics to dish out yet more happy pills on prescription…’
Posted: 6th, January 2006 | In: Tabloids Comment | TrackBack | Permalink
