Essa troca infame foi o incidente que confirmou a reputação de Winston Churchill como um alcoólatra. Tudo começou em 1899. Churchill, aos 25 anos, era correspondente do Morning Post , cobrindo a guerra dos Bôeres. Enviado para a linha de frente, ele levou consigo 36 garrafas de vinho, 18 garrafas de uísque de dez anos e 6 garrafas de conhaque vintage (uma bebida que ele acreditava ser essencial para uma dieta básica). Claramente Churchill tinha melhor acesso ao álcool do que a maioria das pessoas no front sul-africano: dizia-se que suas lojas continham "muitas garrafas de uísque, clarete e porto".
Photo: Driven to drink? Imagine the stress Churchill faced as the British leader during World War II. Pictured here with Franklin D. Roosevelt (middle) and Joseph Stalin (left) in 1943. Photo courtesy of US Library of Congress.
Over the next few decades, Churchill's name came to be linked with two things: drink and war. They were often closely connected. In 1915, many people considered England's future leader exceptionally brave when he opted for the front line; as an aristocrat, he could have chosen a safe post at headquarters. But as a close friend pointed out: "Hard liquor was prohibited at Battalion HQ… and only sweet tea provided, a beverage by no means to Winston's taste."
Churchill could never have given up drink; that much was confirmed by another wartime episode. When George V set a personal example to the troops by giving up alcohol, Churchill declared the whole idea absurd and announced he would not be giving up drink just because the King had.
Photo: Drink loomed large over Winston Churchill's life—but how did it affect his leadership? (Simulated image.)
Even as Prime Minister, Churchill refused to moderate his drinking. He believed Europeans liked leaders who could hold their liquor, so he did nothing to discourage rumors about his alcoholic excess. Churchill admitted he relied on alcohol. He always had a glass of whiskey by him, and he drank brandy and champagne both at lunchtime and dinner.
Somente quando Churchill atingiu a idade de 76 anos, em 1953, houve sinais de mudança: "Estou tentando reduzir o álcool. Derrubei o conhaque e tomei Cointreau em vez disso. Eu não gostava de uísque no começo. Foi só quando eu estava um subalterno na Índia, e havia uma escolha entre água suja e água suja com um pouco de uísque, que acabei gostando. Desde então, sempre fiz questão de manter a prática."
Alguns acreditam que o consumo excessivo de álcool de Churchill causou seu declínio como primeiro-ministro. Como Lord Moran comentou: "Isso torna sua fala mais difícil de entender e confunde o que resta de sua inteligência; e ainda assim ele não tenta controlar sua sede". Quando o assunto foi levantado com Churchill, ele respondeu enigmaticamente: "O álcool é um alimento?"
"Nunca o pior para bebida"Nos 10 anos de aposentadoria antes de morrer, Churchill bebeu mais do que nunca. Ele nunca deixou de tomar uma garrafa de champanhe no almoço e muitas vezes tinha outra no jantar. Um visitante da época observou: "Sempre há um pouco de álcool em seu sangue, e atinge seu pico no final da noite, depois de tomar dois ou três uísques, várias taças de champanhe, pelo menos dois conhaques e um highball ... sua família nunca o vê pior para a bebida."
Essa era a coisa mais notável em Churchill: ele sempre parecia perfeitamente sóbrio. Criado como um aristocrata, ele acreditava que a embriaguez era desprezível e repugnante, e um defeito ao qual nenhum cavalheiro se permitia.
Mas Churchill era alcoólatra? Ele bebeu tanto por tanto tempo que, no final, ninguém poderia dizer.
Às vezes não percebemos o quanto estamos bebendo...Churchill was a prime example. No limit is safe for everyone, different drinks contain very different amounts of alcohol, and the recommended weekly intake varies around the world; some countries quote different limits for men and women to take account of different body weights, biological differences, and other risk factors. During pregnancy, or while you're trying to become pregnant, you are recommended not to drink at all to minimize risks to your baby. For the best advice, tailored to where you live, consult official government/health websites, such as Rethinking Drinking (USA), NHS and Drink Aware (UK), and CCSA (Canada).
But how you drink is more important than how much. Drink with meals and with company. Don't get caught buying rounds – you can end up drinking six pints when two would do. And if you plan a long drinking session, make every other drink a non-alcoholic one. That way, as Churchill once said, you will "take more out of alcohol than alcohol takes out of you."
You might find it amazing—or perhaps even slightly amusing—that one of the greatest leaders in history lived his life under the influence of alcohol. Churchill was lucky: alcohol didn't destroy him or the lives of the people around him; doubtless, on occasions, it helped him to cope with the incredible pressures he faced. Many other people aren't so fortunate: alcohol frequently turns them into abusive, violent monsters, tears apart their families and drives away their friends, before killing them, slowly and painfully, with a toxic cocktail of horrible diseases. Perhaps even more wretchedly, some alcoholics become drink drivers who kill, maim, and blight the lives of unlucky people they don't even know.
The statistics on alcohol abuse are shocking:
- According to the World Health Organization, alcohol kills about 3 million people each year—that's over 1000 times as many people as died in the terrorist attacks on September 11, 2001, every single year [1].
- Alcohol is responsible for approximately 5 percent of all global deaths and about 5 percent of global disease and injury (rounded figures). [1] [2]
- Alcohol costs society more than 1 percent of GNP in wealthier countries. [2] To put that in perspective, wealthy (OECD) countries spend about 5 percent of GNP on education and worldwide the figure is about 4.5 percent. [3]
- In the United States, alcohol plays a role in approximately 3 million violent crimes each year. In the UK, alcohol is implicated in about 700,000 violent incidents (just over half of all such incidents) each year, according to the Office for National Statistics. [4] According to the NCADD, "Alcohol and drugs are implicated in an estimated 80% of offenses leading to incarceration in the United States such as domestic violence, driving while intoxicated, property offenses, drug offenses, and public-order offenses." [5]
- In the United States, somewhere between 7 percent and 35 percent of all fatal car accidents are estimated to involve the use of alcohol in some way, such as a drunken driver or an inebriated pedestrian. (The huge uncertainty comes from the fact that some crashes may have occurred anyway, some are caused by sober drivers hitting drunken pedestrians, and so on.) Fortunately, things seem to be improving. According to the official U.S. Department of Transportation figures, the percentage of total fatalities caused by alcohol impairment fell from about 40 percent in 1990 to 28 percent in 2019—but it's still a shocking proportion. [6]
- Alcohol increases your risk of developing many other serious illnesses and diseases, including heart disease, liver damage, brain damage, high blood pressure (and therefore stroke), and cancers of the breast, colon, esophagus, liver, and stomach. Alcohol also increases your risk of injury or death through such things as drink driving or operating machinery while your judgment is impaired. [7] [8]
- In the United States, alcohol features in about 40 percent of violent crimes; it's also implicated in 15 percent of robberies, 37 percent of sexual assaults and rapes, and 40 percent of homicides. [9] In the UK, alcohol is involved in about 45 percent of all violent crimes and 37 percent of cases of domestic violence. Between two thirds and three quarters of UK domestic violence victims are women (depending on how you measure/define your terms) and around one in four women experience some form of domestic violence during their lifetime. [10] [11]
- Alcoholics variously estimate the financial cost of their addiction between hundreds of pounds/dollars per month and hundreds of pounds/dollars per week. [12]
- Who's most at risk from alcoholism? You're more likely to develop alcoholism if you're male, regularly drink heavily, drink from an early age, if there is a history of alcoholism in your family, if you have mental health problems, or if your peers drink heavily. [13]
- ↑ Global status report on alcohol and health 2018, World Health Organization, quoted in Alcohol: Key facts 21 September 2018.
- ↑ Global burden of disease and injury and economic cost attributable to alcohol use and alcohol-use disorders by J.Rehm et al, The Lancet, 27 June 2009. and Alcohol, World Health Organization.
- ↑ Government expenditure on education, total (% of GDP), World Bank Databank, 2021.
- ↑ [PDF] Alcohol and Crime: An Analysis of National Data on the Prevalence of Alcohol Involvement in Crime by L.A. Greenfield, Bureau of Justice Statistics, 1998. Violent Crime and Sexual Offences—Alcohol-Related Violence, Office for National Statistics, 2013/2014 Crime Survey of England and Wales (CSEW).
- ↑ Alcohol, drugs, and crime: NCADD, 2018. [Archived via the Wayback Machine.]
- ↑ Alcohol Consumption and Traffic Crashes by Professor David J. Hanson, Sociology Department, State University of New York. [PDF] Traffic Safety Facts: 2014 Crash Data Key Findings, US Department of Transportation, National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, notes: "Alcohol-impaired driving fatalities accounted for 31 percent of total fatalities" in the United States. The corresponding figure for 2019 is 28 percent.
- ↑ Reduce your risk: new national guidelines for alcohol consumption: Australian Government, November 2013. [Archived via the Wayback Machine.]
- ↑ Alcohol attributable burden of incidence of cancer in eight European countries based on results from prospective cohort study by Madlen Schütze et al, BMJ, 7 April 2011. Global alcohol-attributable deaths from cancer, liver cirrhosis, and injury in 2010. by J. Rehm and K.D. Shield. Alcohol Res. 2013;35(2):174–83. For a more general discussion, see Does alcohol cause cancer?, Cancer Research UK, March 31, 2021.
- ↑ Alcohol and crime: by L.A. Greenfield, Bureau of Justice Statistics, 1998. [PDF file] The Greenfield study is still widely cited and definitive newer figures are hard to come by. Alcohol Related Crimes, Alcohol Rehab Guide/Delphi Behavioral Health Group, December 10, 2018.
- ↑ Domestic abuse victim characteristics, England and Wales: year ending March 2020, Office for National Statistics, 25 November 2020. More than 40% of domestic violence victims are male, report reveals by Denis Campbell, The Guardian, 5 September 2010. According to a 2014 report on Alcohol, Domestic Abuse and Sexual Assault by the Institute of Alcohol Studies: "Typically between 25% and 50% of those who perpetrate domestic abuse have been drinking at the time of assault, although in some studies the figure is as high as 73%."
- ↑ Statistics: how common is domestic violence?: Women's Aid, 7 August 2006.
- ↑ Quanto dinheiro você gasta por semana em álcool? : Discussão no fórum Soberrecovery.com em 2009. [Arquivado via Wayback Machine.]
- ↑ Fatores de risco do alcoolismo : Mayo Clinic.
