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The Disease Concept of Alcoholism

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  02 January 2018

E. M. Jellinek  and
Brian D. Hore
E. M. Jellinek
Affiliation:
Alcoholism Treatment Unit, Withington Hospital, University Hospital, South Manchester, West Didsbury, Manchester M20 8LR
Brian D. Hore
Affiliation:
Alcoholism Treatment Unit, Withington Hospital, University Hospital, South Manchester, West Didsbury, Manchester M20 8LR
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Extract

Concern over those individuals who drink alcohol to excess goes back many centuries, this concern being directed at the effect alcohol has on the individual and on society. Levine (1978) pointed out that the idea of alcoholism as a progressive disease with the key symptom of ‘loss of control’ did not simply start with the foundation of Alcoholics Anonymous or the publication of Jellinek's monograph. Such a concept is, in fact, at least 200 years old.

Type
Books Reconsidered
Information
The British Journal of Psychiatry , Volume 157 , Issue 5 , November 1990 , pp. 786 - 789
Copyright
Copyright © The Royal College of Psychiatrists 

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References

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