April 13, 2003
Your only man
Drink yourself to better mental health! The New Scientist reports that an Irish coffee mix (i.e. a combination of caffeine and alcohol) could prevent severe brain damage in stroke victims.
The experimental drug, called caffeinol, has the potency of two cups of strong coffee and a small shot of alcohol. When injected into rats within three hours of an artificially stimulated stroke, brain damage was cut by up to 80 per cent.
On a drinking related theme, the Minister of Justice, Michael Mcdowell, has pledged to crack down on binge drinking and underage drinking. He mentioned this during the Progressive Democrat annual conference held in Galway over the weekend. (One side-effect of the electoral success of Sinn Fein, The Greens and the PDs is that they have enough TDs to oblige live TV coverage of their annual conference by RTE. Your licence fee at work)
However, Michael went on to emphasise that his wrath would be confined to cracking down on so-called superpubs (i.e. large chains of pubs). Now, that's good news for the rest of pub owners in Ireland but it won't make the slightest difference to the rate of drinking in Ireland.